


Chemistry

by link621



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-06-11
Updated: 2005-09-06
Packaged: 2017-11-25 10:16:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 53,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/637825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/link621/pseuds/link621
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oishi makes a decision that brings the end of Seigaku's golden pair; Kikumaru wants to know what happened.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

A faint smell of drying leaves and a five-minute rainstorm carried heavy on the air – somewhere between suffocating and intoxicating. Underfoot, there was a light scritch of the pavement with each step the lone man on the tennis court, the whisper of wind in the trees the only other noise.   
  
Stopping at the fence, he let a heavy duffle drop from his shoulder, his opposite hand clinging to the links of the fence. The same cold, worn chain fence – the same painted clay courts – the same permanently stained patch outside the court from “vegetable juice” – the same awful, nauseating twist in his stomach as he unzipped the duffle to play alone.  
  
It was not as though he did not hear the second set of footsteps – the rusty creaking of the door swinging open… it was not as though he could not recognize that walk, from sound alone, by instincts that pulled strings attached to his heart – or, how as it felt to experience, to his stomach.  
  
The grip of his racquet was comfortably familiar; his hands recognized each small groove of the tape about the handle, the weight of the paddle balanced with the weight of the handle, and the way it screamed in agony for its counter-part… a feeling that echoed deep within Oishi himself.  
  
“How long has it been?”  
  
He had a habit of emphasizing a bit oddly – his voice sometimes pausing slightly longer than need-be over certain syllables. It had matured and ebbed with age, barely present in the voice that now was speaking, but it was still there.  
  
 _Do you want to know in minutes or seconds?_  
  
“Seventeen months,” replied the former vice-captain of the tennis club, turning to face the one thing he could not bring himself to face – a truth he could never escape from – a truth that haunted him in every waking second and seduced him toward darker thoughts in the innocence of his sleep.   
  
Nothing had changed – not the scouring pain, not the dark glint of determination in his partner’s eyes, not the two opposing forces of Id and Superego ripping him neatly in two as he took in the sight of a eighteen-years-old Kikumaru Eiji.   
  
Chemistry could not even hope to explain the chemical reaction bubbling up between them – the kind of reaction that often came to an unsatisfying “poof” when one was braced for a massive explosion. The chemicals would change colors, boil, separate, and even “poof,” but the yet unseen explosion, or the promise thereof, kept his shoulders tight – his jaw mechanically set.  
  
 _“I can’t go to university with you. I’ve applied to study abroad.” Those words were not nearly as hard to speak as they were to iterate – the actual physical act of creating the sound was easy, but the uneasy sloshing of fluids in his stomach at his doubles partner’s face was more than a bit unnerving.  
  
He had expected Kikumaru to disbelieve him; to write the statement off as a bad joke on Oishi’s part. Or, better, to get angry and shout about how Oishi was not allowed to leave him behind, breaking up the famed “Golden Pair.”  
  
It was in the locker room; their teammates had long ago left them alone in the room. Oishi’s eyes drifted down to the hand that clasped the very hem of his jersey over his hip. The second hand, coming too quickly after, was on his collar, holding him still long enough to be kissed.  
  
The chemistry – boiling, poofing, _exploding _chemistry – between them was truly astounding. The kiss was light, unintrusive, yet holding layers of passion and unexpressed feelings. The tentative touch of a warm tongue, the trademark taste of nearly sticky saliva, and the feel of another body urging him to not move even a centimeter devoured him whole._  
  
“You said you weren’t coming back.” His hair was shorter, now, than it had once been, no longer having “wings” at the tips of auburn hair. His smile badly clashed with the way his eyebrows drew together and his eyes narrowed. “Why are you here?”  
  
The last time they had parted, it had been on this court: the court that brought them together to begin with. It had been years since either had played club on this court, though they had gone to the same senior high to insure that they could continue to play with one another. It was supposed to be forever – the idealistic voice of youthful wishful thinking whispering in their ears had promised them that they would never be separated.  
  
It was Oishi’s fault – he just grew up a little faster than Kikumaru was ready for.  
  
“Eiji…” The man always had an uncanny knack for finding his doubles partner – even when Oishi was trying to hide from the world, he could never hide from the sixth-sense his partner possessed. Seigaku, a random Sunday, was a display of truly inspired sleuthing skills on Kikumaru’s part. “Look, I…”  
  
So many times Kikumaru had cut off his partner before a long string of apologies with a bright grin or a sheepish look. Then they had both been at fault – then, Oishi had no more to be sorry about. “It’s okay.” Then, it had never been vocal; it did not have to be. “You can tell me later. Come here.” The redhead spread his arms, a light windbreaker with some brand-name logo on it dripping from his arms loosely as though to make him take flight.  
  
There was no hesitation in Oishi. He took the invitation to fold into his former partner’s arms, holding tightly as drowning man to a life preserver. It was the same – the warmth, the natural meld of their bodies, the wholly unsatisfying “poof” of two chemicals reacting violently without release. His heart in his throat, his stomach in his feet, and his mind reeling somewhere far above his body, the only logical thing Oishi could manage to say was, “You smell good.”  
  
He did – Kikumaru smelled of Kikumaru. The same flowery-scented shampoo in his hair, the same mix of a dryer sheet and the natural scent of his home on his clothes, and the familiar scent of just him – just his skin – brought Oishi back to memories of desperate last moments before he destroyed the one thing he had dedicated himself to, if not unwittingly, for years.  
  
“You’re still a dolt,” the other man shot back, though his voice wavered dangerously, threatening to break entirely. His fingers clung to Oishi’s rain jacket, sinking into the cloth as though to dig below – to dig straight to, or even below, Oishi’s skin. “They don’t teach common sense in Italy?”  
  
“If they did, I’d send you there.” Even as he was speaking, his words lost conviction at a wonderful, well missed sensation. It started with a fine tremble through Oishi’s shoulders while air hissed out of his lips in staccato snickers. It moved to his ribcage and abdomen, shaking his whole upper body with laughter as his mouth opened wide and a large, appreciative laugh escaped him.  
  
Kikumaru’s legs melted beneath him, his whole weight in Oishi’s arms. The other man would normally have no trouble holding his friend’s weight, but his own knees felt like butter in the sun, becoming soft with the only inevitable conclusion that they would become liquid below him.  
  
Clasping tight again, the redhead asked, “What  _happened_  to us, Oishi?”  
  
 _That’s a complicated question._  
  
A question that was no easier to face than Kikumaru’s weary, injured expression.


	2. Chapter 2

For weeks a dark storm cloud had loomed in the distant sky, approaching with aggravating patience – they were in no hurry to bring the inevitable downpour, unmindful of the anxiety that the very sight of the gray masses inspired in third-year junior high students nation-wide.  
  
With one pencil behind his ear and a second rapping against the textbook in front of him, the eraser drumming out a rapid and nervous beat, the slouched redhead did not seem to be enjoying himself even a little at the diner his friends frequented. His free hand was near his face, the very end of his thumb between his lips – a nervous habit he probably did not even realize he had. Unlike the other seniors on the tennis team, Kikumaru was enthralled in studying for when the storm hit – when he would finally be taking the high school entrance exams.  
  
As usual, wherever one half of the Golden Pair was, the other half was no more than a meter away. Oishi looked anything but stressed, his attention turned not to his right side where his partner was furiously gnawing his thumb raw, but to the other side of the table where, rather reluctantly, Kaidou was allowing Fuji to help him order something from the menu.  
  
“You don’t get out much, do you?” The tone of Fuji’s voice was pleasant as ever, but the remark was probably an insult hidden in a smile, like most of Fuji’s words. “I think you’d like this.” To emphasize the last word, the smiling boy pointed a slim finger to some particular item on the menu – an item that seemed to only serve to further bemuse Kaidou.  
  
“Next year we have to out-do our sempais! Isn’t that right, Echizen?” Momoshirou declared, grinning over the edge of a milkshake. “Just think, they’ll all be off to high school, and we’ll have free reign of the club!” The boy with spiked hair gave a loud laugh – he sounded drunk. It was borderline impossible to not pay mind to the shouting boy – apparently, other patrons agreed; half the shop had turned at Momoshirou’s last words.  
  
The freshman prodigy across from him, sitting directly to Oishi’s left, cupped his hands over his eyes, as though he were wearing glasses, and muttered in monotone, “100 laps around the court.”   
  
Once again, the boy across from Echizen burst into laughter – Kaidou snapped something reproachful at him – Fuji spoke in a calm but secretly condescending tone. It was an awful lot to give up – quite a bit to leave behind. Growing up to him, though, was just that – leaving things behind.  
  
He was startled away from the antics of his teammates by a warm pressure against his hip and shoulder – Kikumaru had leaned against him sometime while Oishi was otherwise distracted. They were close enough that the longest of curled red hairs lightly brushed Oishi’s jaw.   
  
Their arms were smashed together, grinding the joint of Oishi’s elbow, and Kikumaru probably did not even notice, as he was so absorbed in removing his own flesh from his thumb, from appearances. With a rather unceremonious display of squirming, the vice-captain was able to get his arm free from between their bodies, only to find it had no where to go. With a light sigh and a very small smile, he let his arm drop idly around the back of the booth, circling behind Kikumaru’s shoulders.  
  
He had known – this was one of his supposedly subtle hints that he needed a little “Oishi-time” (Kikumaru’s own exact words). Were it not for the fact that Oishi had no better way of explaining it, he might have teased Kikumaru about it more.   
  
Sometimes he felt like the negative pole of a magnet, attracting the positive Kikumaru to himself with some unseen magnetic power, but that sort of thing, by the laws of physics, works both ways. The Magnetic Force existed between two objects that had an equal pull on one another. Sometimes he wondered if their magnetism was not more powerful than even gravity though gravity could be a terribly one-sided affair. The moon pulled only a little on the Earth while the Earth steadfastly kept the Moon in orbit.  
  
That did sound a bit familiar, after all…  
  
“Right, Oishi?” That was Fuji speaking – devious, horrible Fuji who knew that Oishi had not heard a word of the conversation they had been having.   
  
“Hm?” The senior looked between his friends, finally settling on Echizen who was the most likely to offer up information in a logical manner – Fuji was the second choice in that regard, but his sadistic streak kept him safely as second choice.   
  
Instead, the freshman was the opposite of helpful, his eyebrows drawn together over light eyes. “Oishi-sempai, is something wrong?” He meant well, he really did, but he was only going to cause his upperclassman embarrassment.  
  
He was saved by a most impromptu interruption from outside their table. “Brother?” All eyes turned to Fuji Yuuta, wearing tennis gear with his bag slung over his shoulder – just behind him was the greasy looking boy that had some easily forgotten name – the one Fuji did not particularly care for, and pretended to simply not acknowledge.   
  
“Yuuta,” a smile broke out on Fuji’s face.   
  
“You!” That guy, the unwashed one, shoved a finger at Fuji accusingly. “What are you doing here?” Either he went unheard (unlikely) or Fuji was intent on pretending he did not exist (certain), for the older Fuji brother did not bother to even look at the unwashed kid.  
  
“Is the dorm food bad?” The look on Fuji’s face sent a chill down Oishi’s spine – that was the look Kikumaru would give him just before pouncing on him – literally or figuratively. “I’m sure Mother would be happy to have you for family dinner, if you ever get sick of eating at school.”   
  
“…It’s not like that.” The younger Fuji brother was blushing. “We were just out playing a game of street tennis…”   
  
The new look on Fuji’s face – an expression that certainly did acknowledge the greasy kid – sent an entirely different sort of shiver down Oishi’s spine. There was no doubt in his mind Fuji was crazy, but he did not have to be quite so scary while he was at it. How could Tezuka always seriously face this wacko?   
  
“Perhaps you would like to play a match after we eat, Yuuta?”  
  
“…Yeah, I think that’s a good idea.”  
  
“Ah, sorry, sorry.” Oishi was thrown slightly off-balance when the boy that had been under his arm just a moment before stood in one sharp movement. “You guys should play – but I need to go home and study.” Never had Oishi seen his doubles partner like this – his voice resolute as though he was going into battle, his eyes sharp and focused as Oishi had only seen in the middle of an important match.  
  
He was by no means a poor student, but normally Oishi was the serious student of the two. “Oh… okay. Tomorrow’s Sunday, so give me a call when you wake up, okay?” Oishi also stood to allow his partner to pass by him, sliding out of the booth as Kikumaru did the same. He nearly jumped when his partner snatched his wrist on the way by, dragging Oishi away from the table.   
  
“The vice-captain is coming, too. Sorry for the inconvenience.” He waved over one shoulder with the arm that was wrapped around the book, not sounding even a little bit sorry for stealing away one of the diners from their teammates. “Make sure St. Rudolf-kun washes his hair before he eats.”   
  
There was an outraged, unintelligible shout in their wake, but it did not much bother Kikumaru.  
  
 _The electricity had gone out during the raging thunderstorm, so the two boys had been forced to go to bed early, neither wanting to hunt down flashlights to continue looking over tennis magazines for ideas on new doubles formations.  
  
Oishi had a western-style bed, one large enough to comfortably fit two teenaged boys, and both had been willing to share it for a long time. There was never the awkward attempt to offer one another the bed over the floor, just the normalcy of being a matter of centimeters apart in their sleep. As such, Oishi took the left side of the bed, nearer the window, facing out toward the faint moonlight and rumbling thunder. Kikumaru’s back faced his; his doubles partner was turned on his side toward the room and the door, his breathing coming in too rapidly for him to be asleep.  
  
“You’re thinking about him again, aren’t you?” The question was sudden, a surprisingly loud assault upon the ears like a light bulb shattering on pavement. “You’re wondering what Tezuka is doing right now. He’s probably having a nice afternoon, off making some poor, unsuspecting German kid run laps, or something. Don’t worry about him.”  
  
That was easier said than done. It had nearly cost them a game in the Kanto tournament – Oishi was thinking only of satisfying his promise to Tezuka – both the recent promise and the one he was less likely to share; he believed the words spoken in their freshman year were meant to be private. Even before he and Kikumaru had become friends, there was Tezuka – long before he had any shining tennis skills to speak of or presence off or on the court, there was Tezuka.   
  
It was very difficult to_ not  _think of Tezuka, in truth, after spending so long focusing his goals upon Tezuka._  
  
“We can’t play together effectively if our attention is not focused on the same thing,” the redhead suggested, the sheets rustling and the bed sinking and shifting like displaced water as he rolled over. Oishi could feel his partner’s breath, warm against his neck, now that Kikumaru faced his back. “So we need to think about the same thing – and I’m not thinking about Tezuka.”   
  
Oishi also turned, rolling on his back and turning his head to the side to meet Kikumaru’s eyes at only a small distance – in the dark, his eyes looked black, his hair only vaguely recognizable as auburn, though it might have been a trick of the mind, as Oishi might not have been able to determine the color had he never met his doubles partner before. “Then what are you thinking about?” he asked, both to satisfy Kikuraru’s “tactic” and Oishi’s own curiosity as to the origins of such a serious face.   
  
The other boy made a face, though the lack of light obstructed his features, somewhat. He looked almost disappointed, almost as though he had expected Oishi to be able to read his thoughts. “I’m thinking about you,” responded Kikumaru, his voice alarmingly soft.   
  
A slow burn that began somewhere near his stomach marched up to Oishi’s face until he was certain he was scarlet – it was lucky that it was so dark in the room, lest Kikumaru start teasing him about that, too. For a moment, he could not even find his voice, turned to ashes somewhere behind the virtual conflagration of embarrassment. It only became worse when he felt Kikumaru’s leg brush his, however unintentionally, beneath the covers as Oishi also shifted to his side to face his partner.  
  
The sensation numbed his leg – the moment of warmth followed by the unnatural cold of loosing the touch of another person left him feeling under-stimulated and numb. “I’m not very good at thinking about myself, Eiji.” Perhaps in the introspective way, he could focus on himself, but he was horrible at being more self-conscious – not because he was overly self-confident, but because he was always more worried about other people.  
  
“That’s not what I’m suggesting.” Oishi would never shake the image of Kikumaru’s eyes in that moment – dark as pitch in the insubstantial light, and focused so intently on his partner that Oishi absolutely believed up and down, forwards and backwards, that all Kikumaru was thinking of in that moment was his partner. “I’m suggesting that you think about me.”   
  
“Why are you studying so hard, anyway?” One could never really go anywhere without the other. Rubbing his sore wrist, Oishi sourly thought on that simple truth of their relationship. “High school entrance exams are months away. Besides, you’ve always done well in class – you’ll be fine.”   
  
“That isn’t good enough.” Kikumaru was walking close – close enough that their matching Seigaku regular jackets swished together once every few steps. It may have been awkwardly close if Oishi did not know that he only felt more awkward on nights when Kikumaru would listen to reason and actually go to his own home – most nights, normally, but lately he was more serious about it – saying that maybe some of Oishi’s “smartness” would rub off on him if they were together all the time.  
  
Something was indeed rubbing on Kikumaru, but Oishi suspected it was just the jackets between their flesh. “So, when will you have studied well enough?” Despite the obvious bubbling tension between them – almost thick enough to grab a hold of – Oishi remained comfortable. He knew something was off about Kikumaru, but it did not make the redhead any less his friend and his partner.  
  
“When my scores are as good as yours,” replied the redhead earnestly. “If we’re going to go for a tennis scholarship together, we need to also have the same standards in scores on the entrance exams.” His eyes darted away, focusing somewhere off to his left, a tiny smile on his lips as though he was not certain if he even wanted to be smiling. “I’m not as good at these sorts of things as you are, so I need to study a lot more to keep up.”   
  
That burning feeling returned – the one that boiled up any time Kikumaru abruptly shifted the entire focus of his world from anything but Oishi to Oishi and did not let go. A heavy silence fell between them as Oishi quietly blazed on and his partner continued to have his eyes on anything but him.   
  
The thought had never really occurred to Oishi – he had always assumed that they would be scouted into a high school together; there was no end to the Golden Pair in his sight. Of course a noteworthy tennis school was also going to excel academically – they would have to work hard to make good on a scouting offer. If they really wanted to have their pick of schools and be absolutely certain that they could continue to play together at school, they would have to both perform exceptionally on the exams. So, really, by studying so hard, Kikumaru was, once again, thinking only of his partner.  
  
Oishi, however, had been thinking about Tezuka again; almost every time they would speak, the question would raise in his mind as to where the astounding tennis player and team captain would go after Seigaku – after setting all of his hopes on Tezuka’s guidance all throughout junior high, Oishi had not really made a goal for himself when it came to high school. He had not made a promise to another person like he had with Tezuka, but here was Kikumaru offering him a goal to reach for – and a tangible one at that.  
  
“Let’s do our best, Eiji.” The dark-haired boy smiled, winning an infinitely relieved smile in return from his partner.   
  
In that moment, their jackets swished together and their fingers brushed. Both startled, coming to a stop, though neither looked away. A second silence fell between them, though more comfortable than the first, as the two came to the mutual decision to clasp hands briefly in a reassuring manner – Kikumaru with a clearly forced smile and Oishi feeling a nervous twist in his gut.  
  
They began walking again, as though it were perfectly normal for two boys their age to occasionally grab one another’s hands without obvious outward motivation. Perfectly. Normal. Still, he knew that it would feel terribly weird with anyone else from the tennis club – even Tezuka who was his closest friend for many years.  
  
“What are you thinking about, Oishi?”   
  
With a wry smile, the other boy admitted in a playful tone, “Tezuka.”


	3. Chapter 3

It was a truly miserable day – the sun was shining, the birds had the audacity to be singing, and stargazer lilies were in full bloom, punctuating the gardens with sudden bright flashes of vibrant magenta held lovingly within the gentle fingers of the petals. It was the first year the groundskeeper of the school had managed to sustain lilies through the abnormally rainy summer – they were indeed a very thirsty flower, but too much variation in weather made them angry and inevitably killed them.  
  
He was ready to do a rain dance over the gardens if it would just stop him from –  
  
 _AHCHOO._  
  
–Sneezing.  
  
“You look terrible.” He felt the hand fall on his back before his allergy-fogged brain could process that he was being spoken to, or even who was speaking. Turning dully, his expression probably highly unattractive (as he could not seem to fully open his eyes or entirely close his mouth) he faced the smiling boy beside him. “Perhaps you should go lie down for a few minutes, Oishi. We’ll be okay to practice.”  
  
There was no doubt that he looked as miserable as he felt, if Fuji was suggesting he just leave practice and rest – Fuji knew better than any other person in the club how his teammates thought; he knew that Oishi was standing on the courts on sheer determination alone. He knew how nice it was to have someone say it was okay to give in a little bit and take care of himself, once in a while.   
  
“Flowers,” the vice captain explained with a weary smile. “I’m allergic to those flowers. I just need my allergy medicine, then I’ll be fine.” He felt like he was talking through a haze – as though he was shouting into fog, unable to tell if anyone could actually hear him or see him, as he could neither hear nor see his surroundings. If not fog, an instrumental mute – like the piece of fiberglass wedged into a trumpet to give the note a different sort of quality than normal.  
  
Nothing was left of Fuji’s usual smile, replaced entirely with his form of worry – which, frankly, bore a striking resemblance to his angry face: narrowed blue eyes, lips drawn in a thin line, the slight downturn of the corner of his mouth that would be unperceivable upon any other person but the normally mono-expressional Fuji. Stiff fingers, like a clinging, oversized spider on his back, alerted Oishi that his classmate was serious about his next words.  
  
“I think we should have someone walk you home – this is more than just allergies, temporary captain.”  
  
 _“Good morning, Oi—gah!” The redhead leapt back, his arms flailing out and his face twisting in surprise. “You’ve been possessed by a raccoon demon!” He slipped a hand into one pants pocket, producing a cell phone. “Ah… who do I call? Priest? Monk? Medium?”  
  
“Ghostbusters,” suggested Fuji, startling them both. The good-natured smile he wore, as per usual, made his mood infinitely harder to read. Not that Oishi was going to have any luck that morning anyway. His expression dropped a little – slightly more serious – as he evaluated the object of Kikumaru’s alarm. “You do look like a man possessed.”   
  
“With _raccoon _eyes,” offered Kikumaru helpfully.  
  
“_With _raccoon eyes,” parroted Fuji in agreement.  
  
Oishi’s eyebrows came together, a smile tugging at his lips. “I’m fine. Just didn’t sleep very well last night.” That was the understatement of the century. When he had finally convinced Kikumaru he could not stay the night, Oishi dove head-first into looking over tennis strategies once again, and writing an email to Tezuka.   
  
He was not entirely directionless – he just was not Tezuka. He did not know how to be Tezuka, and he wished Tezuka would not have left him in charge of being Tezuka, which was not, in any way, his forte.   
  
His ever-energetic partner sat on the edge of his desk, elbowing Oishi in the stomach. “Do you have a secret love-life you’re hiding from us? Is that why you left so early last night? Huh?” He was grinning dubiously, his eyes narrowed in “attack mode.” Oishi was under the distinct impression Kikumaru enjoyed teasing him – sometimes the redhead acted like a five-year-old boy with a kindergarten crush on a girl, awkwardly teasing her to express affection.  
  
If Kikumaru started pulling his proverbial pigtails, Oishi was not going to be impressed.   
  
“I was emailing Tezuka,” replied Oishi, snatching his schoolbag up from beside his desk, pulling out the text for their first subject. “And reading about tennis strategy.” He motioned with his notebook. “And finishing homework. You had homework, too.”  
  
To his great surprise, Kikumaru looked distinctly hurt, his entire face falling as though pulled to the ground by a force more powerful than gravity. His voice had grown soft before he spoke again, barely above a whisper. “You know, you could have done those things from my house. We could have emailed ol’ scary-eyes together.” That was a new nickname. “Was I distracting you?”  
  
Damage control was not Oishi’s forte – it was certainly something he wish he had more power over, but by nature he was simply too meek to step in and correct an already bad situation. Often when he argued with someone, it would take days to recover as a combination of his bruised ego and emotional insecurity would staple him to the floor, his tongue tied neatly in a knot.   
  
“You weren’t distracting me, promise.” He gave a small smile, putting his hand to Kikumaru’s shoulder. Quite the opposite, Oishi enjoyed his doubles partner’s company, though it did seem just a bit weird to him that they were so inseparable that a normal level of separation on a school night bothered Kikumaru. It actually made him a bit angry that Kikumaru was hurt by the fact that Oishi had other things to get back to that did not involve Kikumaru… though it was not really fair to be angry at someone for having an emotion.  
  
“…Maybe Tezuka _is _his secret love-life,” suggested the third person in the room, the one who had fallen into anonymity until he spoke, reminding Oishi once again that there was a life outside of the infuriating redhead sitting on his desk. Not that Fuji’s input was any better.  
  
“Fuji, that’s ridiculous.” Pulling himself to his full height, he frowned. “I’m not interested in having a secret, long-distance relationship with my closest friend.” Were he Kaido, he probably would have yelled (and hissed) and pitched a fit just because Fuji had suggested he was dating a male friend. Being Oishi, thankfully being Oishi, he had the composure to respond in a much more dignified manner.  
  
Kikumaru growled – literally growled – a low rumbling sound in his throat. “I hate you, Oishi!” He stomped out of the room, nearly colliding with a classmate in the process. The other boy started to apologize, but was quickly silenced by a snarling noise from the redhead.  
  
The boy with raccoon demon eyes watched helplessly. “What did I do _this _time?”  
  
Fuji continued to smile. “Who knows?”_  
  
If there had been any question in his mind that they were still arguing, it was absolutely confirmed by the trip home.   
  
They walked in silence. Upon Fuji’s insistence, Kikumaru was selected to take their vice-captain home before he passed out from either allergies or sleep deprivation… in honesty, this was much worse than either of those things.   
  
The silence was deafening – each scritch of sneakers on the sidewalk rang out and echoed hollowly in Oishi’s ears, melding with the booming sound of his jacket swishing. His sense of sight and smell were almost entirely shot, his allergies or the lack of sleep blinding him, making the late-afternoon light seem like looking directly into the noon sun. And he was cold. The kind of cold that started in the core of the body, pumping ice water through his heart and down into smaller blood vessels.   
  
Too disgruntled to break the nauseating silence, Oishi instead carried on in pain, trying to ignore the way his vision blurred or the way his fingers twitched and trembled from the cold that threatened to over-run him. He was focusing very carefully on not noticing these things when an arm slipped a bit awkwardly around his shoulders.   
  
“Idiot.” The word was breathed into his ear, passing over his skin with a tickle of humid breath and the ghost warmth of lips. His feet stopped moving, whether by his will or no, and he let himself slump into the support his teammate offered.   
  
Trying to muster a sardonic smile, he shot back, “You’re the one who said he hates me. Obviously, you’ve made an ass of yourself.”  
  
“Of course I hate you,” Kikumaru still sounded wounded – he was not over the earlier incident by any means. Still, he held tight to Oishi… almost as though it was him who needed the comforting. “Because I  _am_  interested.” He slid away from Oishi’s side, though his hand lingered on Oishi’s back a moment before dropping away entirely.   
  
“In Tezuka?” The words fell out of Oishi’s mouth before he really gave them any thought – before he gave the ridiculousness of the words any thought. He would have loved to retract him, but from the way Kikumaru’s mouth twisted, it was quite clear the damage had already been done. “Okay, that was a dumb question. So, what are you interested in?”  
  
The redhead shoved his hands violently into his pockets, looking away. “Doesn’t matter, never mind.” He began to walk a bit faster, the bottoms of his feet dragging against the pavement as he became lazy in his haste.   
  
Oishi watched his back as though watching through water, a distorted and rippling image that took every ounce of his concentration to identify and comprehend. “This is about Tezuka, isn’t it?” A dark frown formed on Oishi’s face, though he could hardly muster the appropriate emotions behind it – mostly, he just felt lost. Why was Kikumaru so angry? Why was he acting as though Oishi had really hurt his feelings? What was Oishi supposed to apologize for?  
  
“It’s not really. It’s not his fault, or anything.” Abruptly, Kikumaru stopped; Oishi collided with his friend’s back, nearly sending them sprawling on the pavement but for Kikumaru’s over-developed acrobatic sense. Instead, they ended up precariously braced on a fence around the garden outside the pet store where their feet had once again led them.  
  
Righting themselves was a perilous task indeed – they were both so embarrassed that even asking for the help of the other would have set their cheeks on fire. Oishi’s fogged brain managed to comprehend just how ridiculous they looked, though he found his limbs were less responsive than he would like them to be. Luckily, Kikumaru was there to help him without a word, taking care of his partner as though they had never argued.  
  
“You aren’t acting much like you hate me,” Oishi tried to point out, though his words were so slurred it would be a small miracle if Kikumaru understood.  
  
“Idiot,” the word had become a staple of the redhead’s vocabulary, it seemed. “You’re my best friend.”   
  
“I am?”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
A long silence followed as realization began to sink into Oishi – the desperate sort of realization that tried to force itself upon him all in one burst but was too much information to take in one sitting. The tension, the irritation… Kikumaru was jealous.   
  
He had known Tezuka for years – they had relied upon one another for years, and their friendship was born of dedication to their promises and common goals. With Kikumaru, it was different – they had absolutely nothing in common when they met. The overbearing Kikumaru nearly smothered the quiet and timid Oishi, but they both pushed one another to be better. Oishi forced Kikumaru to grow up while Oishi was in turn forced to come out of his shell and fall perfectly into the strict mother role of the tennis club.  
  
Carefully, Oishi countered, “I don’t think you’re my friend at all, Eiji.” He tried to meet Kikumaru’s eyes, but the other boy was looking away. “I think… I don’t think friends act like this, no matter how much they care about each other. You’re irreplaceable.”  
  
That caught Kikumaru’s attention – his eyes were wide, his lips barely parted. A small murmur slipped out of his mouth, “What are we, then, Oishi?”  
  
He had no answer for that – he was not sure there was a word in Japanese for that indescribable title. Perhaps it was better not to give it a title.  
  
“I don’t know,” he said earnestly.   
  
They did not speak of it again.


	4. Chapter 4

The words “Kanto Regional Champions” did, in fact, have a very lyrical ring to them. It was the sort of thing some tennis fanatic might write haiku about – what Momoshirou might do if he could coherently form thoughts as he instead sang mindlessly the words over and over with Kikumaru; the latter hung drunkenly from his doubles partner.  
  
Somewhere far detached from the clamor stood Echizen sipping juice from a can and pointedly ignoring the group of freshman worshipers gathered about him. The others were spread between Oishi and Echizen, most notably the limping Fuji being watched over by Kaidou (though he naturally pretended to not actually be concerned). Amidst the choruses of victorious words, Kikumaru would pause to give his doubles partner a sort of knowing look, knocking their heads together in a manner that both sounded and felt a bit hollow and painful.   
  
“Older brother!” All paused to watch the younger Fuji sibling approaching. Despite the strange looks he was getting, Yuuta went straight to his brother, wrapping his fingers firmly around the arm Kaidou was not dutifully guarding. “You should get to the hospital and get that checked out…” He clearly meant the thankfully mild damage to Fuji’s right knee inflicted by his opponent in the match.   
  
The elder sibling tilted his head, smiling fondly. “Ah, you don’t have to worry about me, Yuuta, I’m fine.” Before the younger Fuji sibling could protest, the elder had turned his attention back to Oishi. “Our best performance was by our temporary captain.”   
  
Oishi smiled over his shoulder, bumping foreheads with the joy-drunken Kikumaru again. “On the court? That was nothing. Unless you mean trying to wrangle Eiji.” The sly look in Oishi’s eyes was a rare one.  
  
“Hey! I apologized!” The words were out of Kikumaru’s mouth instantly but were smothered by a warm laugh from his doubles partner – Oishi was just giving him a hard time. The infectious laugh passed from partner to partner before in turn affecting Fuji behind them.   
  
Brow furrowed with concern, Yuuta hardly looked as amused as the others. The younger Fuji’s voice dropped low, barely drifting to Oishi’s ear like a wandering leaf on the wind. “I thought you were going to really injure him… you had that look in your eyes.” He was giving Fuji a look that could only come from a passionate and naïve person such as Yuuta – a silent plea to be wrong in his accusation.  
  
“Kirihara?” The elder sibling laughed. “Psychological damage is far more satisfying to the soul, Yuuta.”   
  
“Brother…” Leaning away, the uncertain younger sibling made quite a face.  
  
Oishi’s attention was stolen back by Kikumaru whose grip was slackening more as he seemed to grow more weary, emotionally exhausted from running himself into the ground with frustration. His song had stopped, replaced by a lazy hum into Oishi’s neck that moved his lips only slightly.  
  
“Congratulations, Captain.” Walking with the help of a crutch and his younger sister, Tachibana approached them with Kamio in tow. The Fudomine regulars clearly considered this moment a mutual triumph for both schools – Fuji’s victory had been a relief all-around. It was also a relief to see the other captain moving around so easily – even if that school had meant nothing but trouble for some of the more hot-headed members of the Seigaku team.  
  
“Vice captain,” corrected Oishi. “You should save your congratulations for Tezuka.” He reached out the hand that was not plastered to his body by Kikumaru, clasping Tachibana’s hand for a moment in a very manly display of companionship.   
  
A small laugh drifted up from Ann as she glanced very pointedly at Kikumaru. “You have a real treasure at Seigaku, don’t you?” Oishi felt Kikumaru stiffen even before Ann asked her next question. “Perhaps we could go out on a date, sometime, Oishi-sempai?”  
  
In the amount of time it took all the blood to drain from Oishi’s face and then all the blood in his entire body to return just there, Kamio was already shouting, Momoshirou had taken notice of the conversation, Tachibana wore a somewhat perplexed expression, and Kikumaru was squeezing the life of out Oishi’s left arm.  
  
As if the reactions from the surrounding crowd were not bad enough, Oishi was terribly nervous around girls… in particular girls who expressed interest in him. Luckily, Ann had a track record for using the word “date” in alternative ways (a habit that caused mass mayhem among her admirers), so maybe Oishi really should not be so nervous. However, to deny a date directly in front of her older brother seemed like poor tact… then again, to accept a date directly in front of her older brother struck him as significantly worse tact.   
  
Maybe it would be best to just ask her what she meant. “Oh – do you want to play tennis with me some time?” The words were spoken with a nervous waiver in inflection and a smile that was anything but real. It was unlikely anyone even heard him over the ranting Kamio and equally fired-up Momoshirou that had somehow engaged the former.   
  
She had nice eyes – she looked pretty blinking at him curiously as though he had grown two more arms and was playing patty-cake with himself. “No, I was thinking we could go to a movie and get some ice cream. You look like the ice cream type.”   
  
“WHAT?” Came the chorus out shouts, one of which was directly into Oishi’s ear from Kikumaru. His gaze fixed on Oishi while the other half of the golden pair, also one of the ones to shout, tried to compose himself to properly answer.  
  
Which would be more likely to make Tachibana angry? It was so hard to tell from the hard expression Fudomine’s captain wore.   
  
“I…” his face was crimson under the pressure of so many eyes fixed on him. If he did not go, doubtless he would never live it down as the only member of the Seigaku team, so far, to refuse a date. Not that the others had a very good dating record, anyway. If he did accept the date, he knew he would be followed by at least Inui and Kikumaru (if not the whole team) and Kamio and his tag-along Ibu (if not all of Fudomine) and would probably be accused of fraternizing with the enemy.  
  
He could not feel his fingers of his left hand – a sort of curious weight set in on his shoulder as his arm just felt like an accidental extension of his body that no longer held any nerve endings. Kikumaru’s grip did not even hurt anymore for lack of blood to the area beneath.   
  
The yelling had ceased – even Ryoma, though from afar, was paying close attention to how Oishi would answer. He did not really have a choice, did he? “I would really like that, Tachibana-chan.”  
  
“It’s Ann,” she corrected him, reaching up a finger to bop his nose. “And pick me up tomorrow after school.”  
  
 _Kikumaru worked furiously to towel the water out of his hair – Oishi was more determined to ring his shirt out. They had both decided to walk home from practice on the rainiest day of the year, naturally, and had ended up at Kikumaru’s house just because it was much closer to the school than Oishi’s.  
  
The lady of the house had laid out some dry clothing, stolen from Kikumaru’s closet, for them to put on once their hair was dry. It was warm, either freshly ironed or just out of the dryer, and cotton – Kikumaru wore no other fabric for his shirts. Unfortunately, Oishi was doomed if he hoped to wear a pair of Kikumaru’s jeans; the redhead was even more slender than he looked under his clothing, possessing almost no hip-bones to speak of, so even a thin boy such as Oishi was too big to swap pants.  
  
The older half of the golden pair remained in his school uniform that was wet around the cuffs of the pants, though he pulled the warm, dry shirt over his torso, liking the way it fit him a bit more snugly than it did Kikumaru. He had never really paused to think about the way his friend was built, but clearly his doubles partner was just slightly more petite in every way.  
  
With no regard for his appearance, Kikumaru wore a t-shirt that had clearly seen a few too many spin-cycles and sweatpants that had been worn during a painting project, from the look of it. The towel that had been in his hair was now draped around his neck, his hair falling limply like the branches of a weeping willow around his face.  
  
There was no taboo subject between them – there had never been anything they did not feel as though they could discuss – but that did not make it any less shocking when Oishi brought up a topic they just had never touched before. “I wonder when you’ll have a girlfriend, Eiji.” The redhead, perched on the edge of his bed, gave Oishi an incredulous look. “That didn’t come out right… I was just thinking, you seem like the type that should have a girlfriend. So… I guess it just would surprise me if it didn’t happen until you were in high school.”   
  
It was true – Kikumaru was dateable: funny, attractive, athletic, social, and passionate. Maybe he could be a little insensitive or self-centered at times, but he usually only had the best intentions. He might not make the most attractive _serious _boyfriend, but he was a wonderful partner, a good friend, and a lot of fun._  
  
He would have a girlfriend long before Oishi ever would. It would be a small wonder if Oishi ever got over himself long enough to even ask someone on a date.   
  
“…You too.” The redhead leaned forward on the bed, rocking in the direction of Oishi. “You’ll be popular with our upperclassmen in high school, I’m sure. You’re mature – girls love guys like you.” He reached out a hand, resting it in Oishi’s hair, looking somewhat distracted. “They’ll even like your bowling ball shaped head. Girls don’t seem to notice things like that.”  
  
His fingers were warm… it felt nice. “And that bandage? The girls are going to think you’re hiding pimples.” Oishi tilted his head, smiling at Kikumaru; the redhead returned the wistful smile, his eyes narrowing just slightly and his hand never leaving Oishi’s hair. Something was wrong. Just as the vice-captain was opening his mouth to ask, however, he was cut off.  
  
“Whoever gets asked out by a girl first owes the other one dinner. It’s a bet,” suggested Kikumaru, his fingers finally sliding away.   
  
“You’re on.”  
  
Oishi had selected a three-quarters sleeved t-shirt to wear to the date; nothing else would have hidden the gigantic bruise on his left arm without being too hot for the summer weather. It was jersey-style, black sleeves over a white middle section, and had the brand name and logo printed in black across the chest.   
  
This shirt was actually Kikumaru’s… it did not fit Oishi the same way, but he had forgotten to return it after borrowing it one rainy night when he needed something dry to wear. Kikumaru had never asked for it back, and Oishi was fond of it, so he just never thought to return it.  
  
“Syuichirou, someone’s here to see you!” His mother’s voice drew him away from the mirror – the mirror that had been reflecting back to him a very frightened and youthful face. It had to be Ann – and he was certain that brought a much more terrified look to his face that he was glad he did not have to see.  
  
But… he was supposed to pick her up.  
  
“Who is…?” Just as he was calling back to his mother, reaching for the doorknob to his room, the door swung inward, startling him and drawing a small surprised yelp from his lips. The visitor was even more of a surprise. “Eiji…”  
  
Something was just a bit different about Kikumaru that night – the way his lips parted very slightly and his eyes were half-lidded. He almost looked tired, but Oishi knew he was only fooling himself to think so. “Oishi.” His voice had that tone – that tone it took on the court when he was tired or injured and clung to Oishi like a lifeline; that tone of giving up, not wanting to give up, of trusting entirely in Oishi to keep him from having to give up.  
  
“Eiji, you know I have a date…” Already, the sinking feeling – a feeling like drinking too much cold water and having it slosh in his stomach – already that feeling had settled in. He knew something was wrong with Kikumaru. The motherly part of him, admittedly the largest part of his personality, was screaming on the inside for him to do something.  
  
Kikumaru advanced a couple paces, forcing Oishi to back peddle an equal amount; closing the door in his wake and eventually moving to lean back against it. Something was definitely wrong with Kikumaru. “Oishi, I don’t want you to go on that date.” He lifted his body off the door fluidly, advancing on the mysteriously paralyzed Oishi.  
  
“…What’s wrong, Eiji?” The words were uncertain and not much more than an over-emphasized exhale. As Kikumaru placed a hand on his chest, he both had millions more questions and no questions at all. He had plenty of questions as to what was going on, but the sloshing feeling in his stomach already knew. “We shouldn’t do this,” he said as firmly as he could manage.  
  
Kikumaru had never listened to him before, why would he really expect him to, now?  
  
It was his first kiss. His knees were trembling beneath him like a shaky foundation under a tall building caught in a strong storm. He was aware of his lips parting very slightly, melding with those pressed against his own. He had never suspected saliva would actually be sticky, or that a kiss would be so wet. It was a bit like dumbly drooling on another person with his mouth open.  
  
Or maybe that was just what a first kiss was like with another person who had no idea what he was doing. It was not, by any means, unpleasant… quite the opposite; he could feel his toes curling in his house slippers and his heart beating heavily in his throat.  
  
…But, Kikumaru was kissing him.  
  
With two hands, he pushed Kikumaru off, trying to ignore the way his body suddenly felt cold with the absence of another human’s warmth and the way his lips felt almost swollen from the unusual contact… almost as though they just needed another kiss to cure the sensation of physical loneliness. Not with Kikumaru – never with Kikumaru. Why did his partner…?  
  
A boiling sensation began low in his body and rose through his chest until his face was on fire – he wondered if his hair was sticking up straight on end like the goose bumps on his arms. “I have a date,” he tried to say, though not even one word passed through his mouth clearly.  
  
“Hervadar?” parroted Kikumaru. Nothing had changed in his expression – his goofy expression offset by a white bandage over his right cheek, today. He looked as relaxed as he had before the kiss, though his breaths were coming in notably shorter; the muscles in his neck were taut. He was as tense as Oishi, just a better actor.  
  
“I have a date to get to,” Oishi repeated this time with more force. If Kikumaru wanted to ignore what just happened – act as though it had not – he was happy to do the same.  
  
Kikumaru did not move – they had to brush bodily in order for Oishi to leave the room. In doing so, it was as though lightning danced between their bodies – binding them together and tingling across Oishi’s skin. He made it to the other side of the threshold before turning back around, closing the door to his room once more. His fingers closed around the back of Kikumaru’s neck, trying a second time to get that blasted kissing thing right.  
  
It was more controlled and less wet. Keeping his mouth mostly closed seemed to help with the saliva element. The noise that came from Kikumaru, though – a strangled noise that could have either been from pain or pleasure brought Oishi back to himself, moving away from Kikumaru again.  
  
One kiss they could have just pretended had not happened. Somehow, Oishi doubted this would be something forgotten by morning.


	5. Chapter 5

Oishi’s first date brought him to an ice cream parlor with a girl that he hardly knew after having kissed the boy who claimed to be his best friend. Despite this, he found that both dating and girls were not nearly as scary as he had believed them to be, up until that moment. Quite the opposite, he was having a marvelous time eating ice cream, seated across the table from Tachibana Ann, laughing easily at the small jokes she made.  
  
Dating, it seemed, was rather a lot like hanging out with a friend – it involved going out somewhere, perhaps to dinner or a movie, having a wonderful conversation, enjoying good company, and knowing that he could call her out again sometime, as long as he did not offend her on the first date. It was not such a bad thing, and it kept his mind far from where it would wander otherwise.  
  
 _A warm, surprised exhale against his lips jut before he kissed Kikumaru a third time – his eyes falling shut before he even realized they were closing. Warm hands around his waist on the small of his back, crawling up and under the fabric of his shirt over toned muscle – skin on skin. His own hands had nowhere to go – not knowing what to do, both fell over Kikumaru’s shoulders, clasping across the back of his neck.  
  
Naturally their faces tilted so they would not bump noses – once again, Oishi’s lips were parted, but this time it seemed to work out just a bit better as he bravely ventured to roll his tongue against Kikumaru’s lips.  
  
A soft moan, Kikumaru’s nails suddenly digging into his skin, the redhead’s mouth falling open, deepening the kiss… oh, and that was strange. Oishi was not certain kissing should be such a terribly odd event – he also had never been warned of what it would do to his insides, twisting furiously as though to make him stop or possibly to egg him on.  
  
His sense of propriety took over only at the last second, conveniently waiting until he had thoroughly melded with his doubles partner, coming as close as they had ever been to actually being one body. When it had finally overtaken him, he pulled away, whispering apologies into the air they shared before sliding out the door so as to not be late for his date._  
  
The third kiss that had, thankfully, not actually happened – that third kiss that had been playing in his mind ever since he left his house to meet up with Ann. Should he have cancelled on her? Sent Momoshirou in his place? It was at least a stupid idea to have left Kikumaru without getting any answers to his questions; it was going to be quite a situation when he saw the redhead next… an embarrassing situation, at that.  
  
It was odd how, even with Neapolitan ice cream in his mouth, all he could think of was the way Kikumaru had tasted – the slight bitterness of his skin and saliva and the way that it had absolutely intoxicated Oishi… he felt like an addict desperately seeking a fix; a smoker who had turned to chewing gum as a relief for the craving he had for cigarettes. Oddly, unsurprisingly, ice cream was no substitute for what was on his mind.  
  
“You seem a bit distracted,” Ann commented lightly, tapping the air with her spoon. Her own chocolate-vanilla twist ice cream had been stirred together until it was the color of dry dirt and was more  _soupy_  than  _frozen_.   
  
Digging his own spoon dutifully through the layered ice cream in front of him, Oishi honestly responded, “It’s Eiji.” It was the strange new ability he had to distinctly remember the feeling of Kikumaru’s hair brushing his forehead or the very faint smell of soap lingering on his partner’s skin after a post-practice shower. “I don’t know what I’m going to do tomorrow.” His spoon slipped from his fingers as both his hands went to his hair. “I did something stupid.”  
  
This was a bad topic of discussion for a date – he should not be bringing up his problems with his love life to his date. Wait… love life? No. Scratch that. His friendship – his partnership – with Kikumaru was what was in question, not the relative active outlet for raging, teenaged hormones. It was not really much of a date if he continued to let his thoughts be focused entirely around another person.  
  
“Kikumaru Eiji?” Ann tapped a finger on her lips. “Your doubles partner, right?” Oishi gave a very small, miserable nod in response to the question. The girl chuckled. “I can’t imagine he would ever be too upset with you, Oishi-sempai. He’s remarkably fond of you.” When Oishi said nothing, Ann jumped to a conclusion – unfortunately, a very accurate conclusion. “He made a move on you, right?”  
  
It was a small wonder his chin did not crack the table at the rate it dropped. He was too embarrassed to blush, instead just stupidly staring at her in pure terror. If he had more control of his outbursts, maybe he could have pretended she was wrong, but there was no use denying it now that she had seen him gape like a hungry fish.   
  
“I’m not surprised.” Ann stirred absently her soupy ice cream, looking wistfully across the parlor. “Until you accepted the date yesterday, I was under the impression you two were already a couple.”  
  
Oishi choked unceremoniously on the saliva he had been attempting to swallow in that moment, hacking like a chain smoker – painful sounding raspy barks of air struggling through his esophagus. The girl across from him looked a little concerned, offering him a drink from her glass of water, but he waved it away, his other hand over his chest as though to brace himself. “I’m fine,” he gasped out, trying to swallow again and make good on his reassuring words.  
  
Did they really act so much like a couple?   
  
As a younger child, Oishi had never had many close friends; Tezuka was the first person he really placed a whole lot of faith and trust in to have it be reciprocated. He had lived a life of hurt when he was young; somehow he had always been the odd man out in every situation that could potentially be thrown at him. He was the last picked for a game, the teacher’s pet, and the boy who spent his free time quietly reading in the classroom while his classmates goofed off.   
  
The only place he had been respected for excelling was in swimming; he had a naturally affinity for team sports, but swimming had been a recreational endeavor that simply  _clicked_ with him.  
  
He never suspected, upon meeting Kikumaru, that they would ever be close. Kikumaru was brash and loud – Oishi quiet and reserved. Somehow it worked, though… after plenty of time spent shouting at one another; crying with one another; laughing with one another… somehow it just  _worked_. The behavior it led to, he assumed, was just that of two of the best of friends.   
  
Then Kikumaru started acting strangely. This was just the most recent incident in his partner’s long line of strange actions. Of course, with this action, things were beginning to come together like the strokes of a paintbrush leading to a full painting. The real problem was what Oishi was going to do about it – what could he do about it?  
  
“He kissed me,” the Seigaku regular finally supplied. There was no use hiding it from Ann after his remarkable reaction to her words. His ears were on fire with a sort of airy and unpleasant feeling in his core; if it was possible to blush with every part of his body, he was downright certain he was. Even his toes were embarrassed.  
  
Another laugh from Ann brought his eyes reluctantly to her face – she looked somewhat sympathetic of his plight, but maybe just did not consider it a plight at all. “Did you kiss him back?”   
  
 _Oh. Oh no_.   
  
Could she not think of anything else to ask? Something a little less on the mark and possibly a little less humiliating? Why did women always just  _know_  those things, anyway?  
  
A heavy exhale escaped him at her next words. “Never mind, it doesn’t matter. But, I don’t think you should be so worried. You enjoyed the kiss, right?”  
  
“It was wet,” Oishi supplied dumbly. “I don’t think kisses are supposed to be wet like that.” Actually, the worst part had been how undereducated he was when it came to kissing. “I think I made a total fool of myself.” He was  _certain_  he had made a fool of himself, but Ann would only deny it if he was so determined to defame his non-existent kissing prowess.  
  
For the second time that night, he was ambushed – Ann leaned over the table, pressing her lips to Oishi’s in a very chaste kiss. It was a nice feeling; it did stop him from thinking about Kikumaru’s mouth for a moment, instead lost in the creamy aftertaste of chocolate ice cream on her lips. However, there was something very different from the kiss that Kikumaru had given him… it was not the skill level that made it different, it was the total lack of natural reaction from his body. He did not automatically kiss back – he did not feel his body sparking and bubbling for release.  
  
It was just a kiss.  
  
When the girl drew away, Oishi studied her carefully. She was pretty, exceptionally pretty, but he was not actually attracted to her – at all. “You aren’t attracted to me at all,” she stated just as Oishi was thinking it. She hardly sounded offended. “You aren’t a bad kisser, for someone who just learned how today. But, that was not a great kiss.”  
  
“…No, it wasn’t,” agreed the boy, taking his spoon from his ice cream again, taking a bite of the semi-melted strawberry band. It was easy to forget the taste Ann had left in his mouth – one bite of ice cream did the trick. “I don’t get it.”  
  
“You will,” assured the girl across from him. “When you decide what to do about your partner.”   
  
Could he even go to school tomorrow and see Kikumaru? He was going to fail all of his classes and play simply miserably on the court whether he went or not. How long would it take before he could look his partner in the eye? Had anything changed? Worse, had  _nothing_  changed?  
  
Oishi feared he would never understand the principle of kissing.


	6. Chapter 6

Sometimes he found himself staring.  
  
Staring had a really bad reputation as a verb – it suggested voyeurism or obsession with one particular object; or maybe even total vacancy of the mind. It was not like glaring that was gifted to those who were irritated or glancing for those who only wanted a quick look, it was a long term commitment to making an ass out of himself publicly in front of his team, their opponents, spectators, and worst of all the object of his stares.  
  
The connotations of the word “stare” aside; the real problem was the denotation.  
  
He had memorized the curves of his doubles partner’s calves – he knew just where the muscle was toned, where it disappeared into tennis shorts, and he even took notice if the redhead decided to wear different socks – it was easily evident. They wore the same brand and make of shoes, they shopped for all their supplies together, so there was nothing terribly fascinating about Kikumaru’s feet that he could not discover simply from looking down.  
  
Narrow shoulders over a slim back and waist, a shape that made his partner easily recognizable from behind, brought Oishi’s eyes back down in the way that the legs brought him up leaving his stares directed at the redhead’s slender waist and… below…  
  
Blushing was so commonplace for him – ever since this ordeal with his partner began – that he did not even notice when it started up, anymore. He knew it was happening, if he focused consciously on it, but he typically just assumed it would happen basically once every five minutes as long as so much was left unsaid between the Golden Pair. It was causing them to play like a couple of beached whales with racquets, too.  
  
Echizen had expressed concern, in his own sardonic way, for the way the Golden Pair flopped about the court uselessly, lacking their normal coordination entirely. Fuji and Inui had both been a bit more blunt than Echizen, right-out asking what was going on (and in the case of the latter, threatening them with some terrifying “juice”). Concerned glances from Kawamura off the court seemed to be the most he was willing to offer; if a racquet was in his hand, he just shouted in broken English, as per usual. Whatever Momoshirou was thinking about, it was not focused on the relative health of his sempai’s relationships, so he said nothing.  
  
It was Kaido that was the real shock – the boy known as Viper had directly approached Oishi and told him that he was getting worse. He never asked why or what was going on, just told Oishi that he needed to play more like himself if they were going to make it through Nationals.   
  
It was not that he did not want to talk to Kikumaru about it – quite the opposite. Unfortunately, there had been a different reason every day, it seemed, why he honestly could not get alone with his partner. Unlike so many people who would make up a myriad of excuses to avoid the sort of discussion they needed so badly to have, Oishi who would never have fabricated an excuse seemed to have nothing but reasons to not be around his partner.   
  
The first thing he noticed was how terribly lonely it was. He had hardly seen hide or hair of Kikumaru in four days, outside of the classroom and on the tennis court. The second observation, however, was that it was not really such a bad thing… it was strangely pleasant to get a small break from the boy he had started to think of as his moon in orbit.   
  
Besides, if Kikumaru was within sight, his mind – much to his dismay – created images of his partner pinned against a wall, tilting his head just so their lips could meet… or suddenly jumping on Oishi in the locker room wearing nothing but a towel, pressing his partner’s back against the cold metal of the lockers.   
  
It had to be hormones. This was just his adolescent body getting the best of him. Hormones. Right.  
  
The sudden onset of a headache staggered him, causing him to nearly fall over, clutching his forehead as though he had been smacked. “Oishi-sempai, I’m sorry!” He registered Momoshirou’s words as though the other boy was yelling from somewhere distant and his words barely carried. What was he apologizing for?  
  
The hollow “pong” sound of a tennis ball bouncing off the court alerted him to his assailant – when did he get hit in the head with a ball? Furthermore, when had Momoshirou served? Glancing up, he could see Kaido giving him quite a “you idiot” look and Momoshirou looking quite concerned that his upperclassman had, for one, not returned the serve, and for another had not even noticed the serve, allowing himself to get smacked in the face with it.  
  
In retrospect, it was not terribly bright of him to allow his mind to wander so far from the court and the practice match – he would just have to stay more focused.  
  
“Oishi,” the concerned murmur that came from less than a meter away startled him even more than the realization that he had been unintentionally attacked without even seeing it coming. Kikumaru stood close, one hand reached up as though to examine the spot where Oishi had been hit, looking just a little bit nervous through his concern. “Do you need to sit this one out?”   
  
The natural reaction was to say “no,” and keep playing even though he could feel the aggravating pound of pain in his head with every heartbeat. The concern in his partner’s eyes made him pause, however. They were dark and almond-shaped – eyes that girls would kill to have… eyes that could be used as fatal weapons. Compelling, to be certain, and in truth, it would be a dumb idea to go home with a headache when he could just take some ibuprofen and be done with it.  
  
There was an alarming moment when all Oishi could think was that Kikumaru had nice eyes – eyes he had never really thought to notice before.  
  
Oh, that needed to stop. “Sorry to trouble you, but could you take me to the nurse’s office, Eiji?” He tried his best to give his partner a significant look, but judging by his partner’s reaction, he was a bit too serious about it – he probably just looked angry. Still, Kikumaru only stepped back a bit; lingering the longest by Oishi’s side that he had since he was left to his own devices in the older boy’s room.  
  
He finally gave a small nod, turning back to Momoshirou and Kaido with an apologetic smile. “Sorry, guys, but I think Oishi needs to go to the nurse. Play on without us!” His hand wrapped around Oishi’s right elbow, coaxing the other half of the Golden Pair to follow him off the court. The inevitable reactions as they left went ignored, though Oishi would never quite shake the look Fuji gave them as they walked off the court.  
  
He looked angry – his eyes were narrowed and his lips pressed tightly together, focusing a deep blue gaze directly upon Oishi. The vice captain half-expected Fuji to yell something out to him; something along the lines of, “Hurt Eiji and I will murder you.” He would, honestly, not be surprised if Fuji were to challenge him to a match sometime in the coming weeks… if things kept up as they were, Fuji would eventually have to defend Kikumaru.  
  
Not really knowing how else to disarm the look Fuji had in his eyes, Oishi gave a small bow and called out, “Please excuse us.” Bowing was a bad idea – his head really did hurt. Momoshirou probably was not aware of the weapon of an arm that he had.  
  
It did not much look as though Fuji was going to let this one go – he had that obsessive glint in his eye as he did when he had chosen his next target.   
  
The pleasant feeling of Kikumaru’s skin against his coupled with being dragged away from the court, though mindfully, turned his attention away, once again, from Fuji and back to his partner. A faint smile made it onto his lips – a moment alone, finally, when they could clear up this… what had to be a misunderstanding.   
  
“Did you know you’re bleeding?” The question from Kikumaru caused Oishi to reflexively touch his free hand to his forehead, coming away with a small smear of blood on his fingertips. No wonder Kikumaru had been so worried. “Really… pay a little more attention, next time.”  
  
“You sound like me,” commented Oishi almost in wonder – the concept of his partner being the mother hen of the two of them was entirely foreign.   
  
“Oishi, that’s mean!” Kikumaru punched him in the arm playfully, his lips pursing together and turning downward in one of his classic pouts. He could win over the heart of even the most cold-hearted with that expression; as far as Oishi knew, Fuji was the only person alive that was totally immune to his partner’s charms. “Don’t compare me to you!”  
  
“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean?” The other boy yanked his arm from Kikumaru’s grasp, folding his hands across his chest. “I don’t think it’s such a bad thing.” He tried to keep up the irritated look – his facial muscles were dangerously inclined to disobeying him and plastering a grin on his face. It did not much help that moments later, Kikumaru flung himself into Oishi’s body, his arms holding tightly about his partner’s shoulders.  
  
“I don’t want to be Oishi – I want Oishi to be Oishi,” the redhead explained quietly, the smile that Oishi could not see clear in his voice. “I thought Oishi was going to disappear entirely – that Oishi was so angry with me, he decided to run away.”  
  
That was the exact opposite of what Oishi was feeling – he was trying to get a chance to be with Kikumaru alone constantly, with no success, and he certainly was not angry about what had passed between them – he just did not know what to think; or why it was that everyone else did seem to know what to think, and that they thought something that Oishi had never thought of to begin with.  
  
 _Headache…_  
  
“I’m not upset with you, Eiji,” the older boy promised. “But we do need to talk.” Those words deflated Kikumaru; the redhead became limp against Oishi’s side, letting out a sigh simultaneously as though the air slipping from him powered his muscles. “ _Eiji_.”  
  
“You’re right,” his partner agreed after a pause. “Let’s go somewhere they won’t find us.” He slid away from Oishi, his fingers lingering over Oishi’s uniform – pin-pricks of intense heat dragging across his shoulders and drawing a, thankfully, belated shudder from him. He could feel the flesh of his neck raising in goose bumps – his body tilting slightly toward Kikumaru subconsciously as though to prolong the contact.  
  
That absolutely  _needed_  to stop.  
  
 _The redhead produced a roll of athletic gauze tape from his pocket, tearing off a small piece with his teeth and grabbing for Oishi’s hand. The dark-haired boy hardly had the chance to stutter out a questioning sound before Kikumaru laid the tape across the small cut on his palm, taking the care of an artist restoring a painting by his favorite painter. Still holding his partner’s hand, he turned his head up so Oishi was no longer just looking at red curls but at almond-shaped eyes and an adoring smile.  
  
“All better,” he announced, rubbing his thumb once more over the bandage before releasing Oishi’s hand and slipping the tape back into his pocket. They had gained the attention of all the other students in the hallway – all of which were now looking at Oishi with eyebrows raised or knowing smirks. What they knew that he did not, he could not be certain. He did know he was the color of the sunrise on a stormy day.  
  
He blinked once at their audience before turning back to Kikumaru and whispering, “That’s just abnormal. No one keeps bandages in their pocket like that.” Then again, when his comment drew Kikumaru’s attention back to him, he got a good gander of the bandage across Kikumaru’s cheek. Perhaps someone – at least one someone – really did always have bandages on his person. “Never mind,” Oishi said with a sigh.  
  
With a devious snicker, Kikumaru beamed back at his partner, giving a victory sign. “It came in handy, right? So don’t complain, Oishi.” He gave a flippant wink before disappearing back into the classroom. A jolt ran through Oishi’s body like a bolt of lightening grounding; on its way down, it skewered his heart and stapled his feet to the floor.   
  
Winking – playfully winking – that was just Kikumaru, he should not be so disturbed over it. Though… it was a good sort of disturbed – was there such a thing as a good sort of disturbed?  
  
“You look lost.” Every nerve in Oishi’s body shouted at the sudden auditory stimulation, causing him to jump half a meter from the ground, waving his hands out in surprise – bracing for an attack. When he coaxed his eyes open, he was faced with his friend of many years looking severely under-impressed and closely trailed by Fuji.  
  
Most people were made nervous by the serious face that Tezuka wore all day every day, but Oishi could tell when his captain was actually upset and when he was just being regular, grumpy Tezuka. This time it was the latter… it made Oishi feel comfortable; Tezuka never surprised him. He could absolutely trust Tezuka to never surprise him – it seemed that Kikumaru did nothing but that.  
  
The perpetual smile beside Tezuka gave a small wave. “Good afternoon, Oishi.” His eyes opened narrowly, fixing intently on Oishi’s hand as it was offered in a wave in return. “Did you injure yourself?”   
  
“Huh?” Oishi looked from Fuji to his hand; he had forgotten about the injury itself while dealing with Kikumaru’s enthusiasm to patch it. “Oh… it’s not a big deal. I’ll wash it out with antiseptic when I get home.” He let that hand fall into his pants pocket over his right thigh, his other hand making an arching motion. “Are you guys still on your lunch hour?”  
  
Tezuka was silent, his eyes flicking to the room where Kikumaru was making quite a bit of noise – as per usual. The boy beside him offered up an answer in his stead. “Yes, we had lunch with Taka-san. Did you eat with Eiji?”  
  
The other boy shook his head. “No, I had a student council meeting during lunch; I thought he was going to eat with you guys.” That was a bit worrisome – while they did eat every lunch together when it was possible, if Eiji had not sought out his friends during the lunch break, where could he have gone? He did in fact eat, right?  
  
“I’m sure he ate, Oishi. He isn’t the type to willingly skip a meal,” the deceptively happy boy commented, quelling Oishi’s worry as though he had read the vice captain’s mind.  
  
Pretending to be oblivious to the conversation, Tezuka checked his watch. “We’ll be late to class.” Without giving Fuji a chance to agree to walk with him, he began walking again. “Remember we have a meeting after classes today, Oishi.”  
  
“Right, Tezuka. I’ll see you later.” He turned his attention back to Fuji. “Aren’t you going to walk with him?”   
  
The boy shook his head. “He won’t get lost without me.” His eyes fixed upon Oishi in a way that he could not hope to understand – almost evaluating, but at the same time as though he planned to demand something of his friend. “He’s not like Eiji.”   
  
Oishi gave a long blink but Fuji did not feel the need to elaborate, apparently, slipping past the vice captain in pursuit of Tezuka. He was followed by a few girls that followed him everywhere – Fuji, like Eiji, was naturally popular with girls. He was certainly pretty enough to be a girl, but Oishi had a feeling that his friend would not appreciate that sentiment, were Oishi to express it aloud.  
  
He’s not like Eiji… right?  
  
After a pause to watch Kikumaru vault playfully over a desk to impress some girl in his class, Oishi followed his teammates down the hall to his own classroom._  
  
The school had gone quiet but for club activities – it was easy to find a corner between school buildings in the shade where they could sit down together on the cold, rough pavement and talk. The brick of the building snagged at Oishi’s shirt, dragging it sideways with every small movement he made. The sky was so blue – a color that had no name but generic blue – and his attention turned upward for as long as he could stand; the light offended his still throbbing head.  
  
He let his eyes slide closed, seeing a wall of red as the backs of his eyelids were light from behind like a screen in a shadow-puppet play. He took a deep breath, trying to center his thoughts – his questions – but was interrupted when he felt cool fingers press into his temple, pushing a bandage over the spot that had been openly bleeding minutes before.  
  
Funny – were those fingers not warm when he was last touched?  
  
Oishi opened his eyes, finding it was a mistake – his partner was so close that all that he could focus on were lips parted in concentration and the thin line of sweat that was rolling down the side of Kikumaru’s face. If that had not been mistake enough, he left his eyes open long enough that Kikumaru took notice, their eyes meeting from close proximity.  
  
He had heard it called “butterflies in the stomach,” but it felt a bit more like indigestion to Oishi – his stomach threw a gurgling tantrum while his heart pattered about as like a hyperactive child on a sugar buzz. His throat felt curiously dry – dry like a towel fresh out of the dryer on newly showered skin. He also found his saliva was curiously thick – impossible to swallow – gluing his jaw to the rest of his skull and keeping his mouth steadfastly closed.  
  
“Why did you say yes to her?” The words slithered from Kikumaru’s mouth, sneaking away from him in a whisper and crashing down over Oishi’s skin like powerful waves of a tropical storm washing away unsuspecting villagers.   
  
Unclamping his jaw with a painful pop, Oishi managed to mutter in return, “I didn’t have a choice – in that situation I was obligated.” It was a catch-22; if he were to say no to Ann, he would have had problems – if he had said yes to Ann, and he did, he still apparently had problems. He did enjoy the date, of sorts, though he only ended up talking to her about the trouble he had with Kikumaru – he doubted it really counted as a date, but he had made a friend in the process.  
  
It was his turn to ask a question. “Why did you try to stop me from going?” He was still a little worried about addressing the real problem – or rather, addressing the problem that supposedly led to the real underlying problem.   
  
He had expected Kikumaru to shy back or look away, but instead, his partner put his forehead against Oishi’s, freezing up the inner workings of his mouth once more. A rock – a very large rock, perhaps even a boulder – had settled directly below Oishi’s diaphragm, for he could not draw a proper breath through his nose; his mouth was, obviously, even more out of the question.  
  
There was not going to be an answer to the question – Kikumaru was instead tilting his head, leaning in toward Oishi with his eyes closed. He was stealing air from the breaths Oishi could not draw before the older boy could finally bring himself to react, reaching up a hand and putting it over Kikumaru's lips.  
  
That was bad enough – the soft feel of Kikumaru’s lips pressed limply and unintentionally against his fingers produced a tingle in his kneecaps. How were his kneecaps even affected by the kiss?   
  
Never would he understand the principle of kissing – never.  
  
“Don’t, Eiji,” he managed to say, though the words choked out of him unwillingly. “Don’t if you can’t answer my question.”  
  
The redhead blinked, finally sitting back on his heels. His eyebrows had drawn together over wide eyes, his face in a curious line as he always looked when he was most perplexed. “I can’t – I don’t…” His features suddenly contorted in frustration – it was reminiscent of how he would look in a match when he could not figure out how to beat his opponent: the look that always prodded Oishi into interfering and helping his partner.  
  
Only, this time, he had no clue how to go about that. He was just as confused, if not more so.   
  
“Forget it!” The other half of the Golden Pair shook his head furiously, rising from the ground with his fists clenched. “Just forget it – you’re giving  _me_  a headache!”  
  
Oishi felt a laugh slip out of him – this was much more like the Kikumaru he knew. Though… even if Kikumaru did, and wanted him to, he was not so sure that he could forget the kiss, as per Kikumaru’s wishes.  
  
“I need aspirin,” whined the redhead.  
  
“You didn’t get hit with one of Momo’s smashes,” countered Oishi. When Kikumaru offered him a hand to stand, he took it gratefully, allowing himself to be pulled to his feet. The indigestion feeling had subsided, leaving behind a gnawing sensation as though thousands of small bugs chewed on his insides – an omen of what was to come.   
  
Anything was better than that horrible feeling that something was about to explode in his face.  
  
“You are so much worse than his smashes!” Kikumaru sounded upset for a split-second, but proved himself to be joking quite quickly with a wink he tossed at Oishi.  
  
His insides were immediately returned to forgetting how to digest properly. No matter how much he wanted it to not be the case, those two small kisses had changed everything – _everything_.  
  
Realizing his breath had not come naturally in several minutes, he prayed he would remember how to inhale and exhale as he had always naturally done sometime between the trip to the nurse’s office and returning to the tennis court.


	7. Chapter 7

_Tezuka, how are you?  
  
We’ll be there around ten tomorrow – are you coming to pick us up? I know the rest of the team can’t wait to see you; even Echizen is getting excited about it._  
  
He stared at that beginning of the email for a long time before deleting it and starting over.  
  
 _I really need to talk to you about something when I get there. No, it’s not another question about tennis, it’s about Eiji._  
  
His pinky key pressed and held the backspace key as he leaned forward with a sigh. His free hand went to his hair, slipping through the short, dark bangs and over the back of his skull.  
  
 _Eiji kissed me. I have no idea why or what’s going on._  Tezuka would appreciate the directness.  
  
 _I can tell you about it when I see you; Tezuka, I think I enjoyed it. I can’t stop thinking about it._  
  
Glancing over it again, he deleted it again.  
  
 _Tezuka,  
Eiji kissed me. I kissed him. We stopped seeing each other for a while and now everything’s back to normal, but we haven’t talked about it at all. I don’t know what to do. Am I thinking about this too hard, like usual? Please tell me I’m thinking about it too hard.  
  
I’ll see you tomorrow; I can tell you about it, then. I’ve really missed you during this whole mess. Please come back to Japan soon.  
-Oishi_  
  
\---  
  
The flight back from Germany was far quieter than the flight there – Momoshirou and Kikumaru had both lost their initial fascination with the prolonged flight over multiple countries, bodies of water, and continents. The former had taken the opportunity to fall asleep with Echizen snoozing on his shoulder a few rows back from Oishi. Similarly, Kaidou sat with his head bowed forward alongside Kawamura who had collapsed against the window with a thin, blue airline pillow between him and the hard surface of the plane.  
  
One row ahead of Kaidou and Kawamura were Fuji and Inui; clearly fascinated by what he had seen in Germany, Inui was scribbling in his usual notebook while Fuji stared out the window with a most curious expression on his face. It was rare that Fuji would have the distant look of an abandoned bride in his eyes; the look that said he would wait at the alter as long as it took for his groom to return.  
  
Oishi was still trying to shake the mental image – it did not help that Kikumaru had wanted to talk about it almost constantly since they had accidentally witnessed something neither of them really wanted to. The redhead would turn in his seat to try to catch Fuji’s eyes. The one time he caught the brunette’s attention, Fuji came up to the front of the cabin to speak with them.  
  
They were in business class – oversized gold leather seats and service that was many times superior to flights Oishi had been on in the past made him feel a bit out of place, though certainly very physically comfortable. It was also not a full flight – Fuji was able to take a seat across the aisle from Kikumaru while they spoke; the brunette bobbing his head and smiling as normal while Kikumaru interrogated him in sharp whispers.  
  
He just did not have the heart to try to pay attention to the conversation – Oishi wanted to ask Tezuka about it, instead. His eyes were turned to the clouds beyond the window, the way his nose pressed against the window causing him to inhale the stale smell of the plastic and glass compound. He was far from claustrophobic, but if there was a time he was going to start being so, it was then.  
  
“What’s with you guys, then?” Unintentionally, probably, Kikumaru’s elbow jabbed deep into Oishi’s gut as he shifted excitedly. The redhead did not seem to notice, despite the disgruntled “oof” from his partner. “Are you a – a  _thing_?” Gossips - put Kikumaru and Fuji together and the product was a pair of gossips.  
  
His mask never slipping, Fuji replied, “I’m not sure what Tezuka would consider us.”  
  
 _Perhaps what surprised him the most was the innocence of the moment.  
  
With thin fingers, Fuji plucked the wire frame glasses from the team captain’s face, handling them like delicate and expensive art as he folded them and placed them on Tezuka’s desk.   
  
The captain looked completely different without his glasses – it was not new to Oishi, but it always surprised him how handsome Tezuka was with nothing to obscure his features: a defined chin, a thin nose, bright, focused eyes, and a mess of dark hair. His expression was a little softer than normal, there were no creases of concentration or stress on his forehead and a very thin smile replaced his usual frown.  
  
Oishi could feel Kikumaru pressed against him, joining in his curious vouyerism, his breath spilling across his neck like hot coffee in his lap. Half of Oishi wanted to jump or bat at Kikumaru with a hand, but the other half was paralyzed. He tried to glance over to his side, moving his head as little as possible only to find his doubles partner was fixing his attention intently on Tezuka’s room.   
  
The captain was sitting as straight as possible in his chair at his desk, his head tilted up and back for Fuji. The latter had moved close enough that their knees brushed, leaned over to press their lips together. While Fuji kept one hand to himself, the other was holding Tezuka’s chin up toward him, Tezuka had wrapped his hands around the backs of Fuji’s legs, his fingers holding tight to the denim of Fuji’s jeans.  
  
Each kiss was soft – none were probing. They hardly moved but to break and restart the kiss, soft smacking noises coming from the seal between their lips being broken only briefly before starting anew.   
  
It was… totally unexpected.  
  
As were the fingers tangled in a ball of his sweater, drawing him away from the door and back into the hallway. It was several minutes before Kikumaru let him go – several minutes of staring at one another with the almost inaudible noises their classmates were making as their soundtrack.   
  
Oishi’s heart beat so fast and so hard that he wondered if it would not jump from his chest in a messy explosion of passion and blood. If they could find this – if Tezuka and Fuji could find something together – would it really be so weird for Kikumaru to want to increase the level of their physical intimacy?  
  
Was this just one of those parts of adolescence he did not quite understand yet?_  
  
The trip home was long if one could not sleep – Oishi’s mind had wandered far off into space, his eyes pretending to watch the clouds pass beyond the window. The rest of the passengers in business class were asleep and even the flight attendants had not walked down the middle aisle in what seemed like hours. It had become difficult to judge time.  
  
Kikumaru had predictably decided his partner was his pillow, flopping over Oishi’s shoulder, breathing into his collar and flopping one arm over Oishi. Twice the older boy had attempted to remove the arm from his waist; both times it had returned only moments later – Kikumaru was even more determined to be physically close to other people than he was when he was awake. It was almost shameful – Oishi was glad the stewardess had not been by.   
  
More shameful that he found himself whispering to the unconscious Kikumaru, “You can’t make this easy on me, can you?”  
  
 _\---_  
  
Tezuka,  
It looks like the plan was a success. At the very least, Kikumaru is emboldened after seeing that. Oishi would be really moved if he knew you did that for his sake – you can be such a bleeding heart. I wonder how long it will be before the whole team knows that you’re nothing but a sap?  
  
So, should I be calling you Kunimitsu, now? It’s a nice name – sounds sort of feminine, though. Perhaps Kuni-kun? Kuni-pon?  
  
We should really do that again sometime, Kuni-po.  
-Syu-ko  
  
\---  
  
Fuji -  
I refuse to call you that ridiculous name, and I will not allow you to call me “Kuni-po” or any such deranged reformation of my given name. We are not on a first name basis – you will run 100 laps for every time you forget this in the future.  
  
Thank you for helping Oishi. I regret that I cannot be there to do something for him myself. Please control Kikumaru’s enthusiasm – I think he’ll only frighten Oishi.  
  
You ought to be in bed. Don’t you have practice in the morning?  
Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
You remembered. I’m so touched, really.  
  
Eiji doesn’t operate within the normal laws of nature, Kuni-kun. You know that. I can’t control him any more than I can control the weather.  
  
We have tomorrow off. Kaidou and Inui did offer to train with anyone who is interested, but I think we all need a day off, now and again, don’t you?  
-Shu-puri  
  
\---  
  
That’s 100 laps, Fuji. I expect you to go to training with Kaidou and Inui after not sleeping and sprint all 100.  
  
I have studying to do. Go to bed so I can get work done.  
Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
Can’t sleep if I’m still here to bother you, Mitsu-ko?  
  
\---  
  
1,000 laps!  
  
\---  
  
Oishi –  
You are thinking too hard again.  
Tezuka  
\--- 


	8. Chapter 8

Whistling away like a songbird, Kikumaru folded clothing into his duffle, unmindful of the eyes that had followed his every small twitch and twitter from the moment his fingers looped under cloth to the moment each garment lay flat in the bag. No one but Oishi would ever guess that the redhead was actually quite organized when it came to things like packing. Perhaps it was not the case any other time, but when it came to clothes, Kikumaru was in tune with some higher presence.  
  
“Heh, I wonder who they’ll choose for the international tournament?” His voice was just a little higher than normal, squeaking out through dry lips. Often in the early morning, Kikumaru did not sound himself – he slept with his mouth open all night, leaving his throat and lips dry. “I want to play with Oishi,” he added, turning his attention to the boy watching him from the adjacent, unused bed.  
  
The older boy nodded, his lips curving minutely at the edges. His bag had already been packed when they woke up that morning; his only task upon waking up was to shower and to retrieve his bag of toiletries from the bathroom. His hair was still wet, the longest parts clinging awkwardly to his skull in smiling curls.   
  
When his hair was wet, Kikumaru looked basically the same. The massive mess on his head looked worst when he first woke up, but it was very difficult to control; even Oishi’s hair gel did no good against the natural flipping curls of his partner’s locks. Some of that untamed hair curved alluringly around large, almond-shaped eyes, resting against undefined cheekbones.  
  
In truth, there was no such thing as a time when Oishi did not want to play with Kikumaru – whether as his partner, or as his favorite opponent. However, he did not think his performance stood out enough to net him a spot on the Japan team. “I’m sure Tezuka will help the other coaches choose the best team.” He tried to smile reassuringly at Kikumaru, but the redhead was not buying it, already yelling at him for being too passive.  
  
Too passive to too passionate – in that regard, they were complete opposites. Though… anyone who knew them well would know that Oishi, in his heart, was the passionate one – it was Kikumaru who had a shallow and unfeeling side despite his outward energy and kindness.   
  
The room was quiet again after the younger boy was out of words to throw venomously at his partner, instead only filled with the pleasant sound of the air conditioner whirring over by the window and cloth brushing as it was folded and neatly returned to the duffle bag on the used bed.   
  
Silence between them was louder than the subway station at rush hour. As long as there was something sitting between them untouched – something made worse by sharing a room for a week – they were never going to be able to operate normally as they had before.   
  
It was  _attraction_.   
  
Oishi understood, conceptually, what attraction was – he liked to think of it as two magnets with opposing poles that would draw together by the magnetic force. Sometimes he thought of it as two objects gravitating together by the pull of one mass on the other. The attraction he was feeling now, though, was neither magnet or gravity (both fairly acceptable in his book) but chemicals in the brain telling his every nerve ending that he should have been gravitating toward his partner.  
  
He noticed it the most during the night when they had both agreed it would be impossible to sleep in different beds – the one closer to the door had been left entirely untouched. So used to sleeping in the same bed were they that it seemed unnatural to sleep alone, despite the bounds of social awkwardness they had placed upon physical contact.  
  
“Eiji,” the dark haired boy waited until his doubles partner had zipped closed his duffle and turned his attention to the speaker. “Can we talk… I mean, before we go down to the closing ceremony?” He could see his partner shift uncomfortably, though the boy agreeably came to sit next to Oishi, his eyes averted.   
  
Another booming silence slid up through the small amount of space between their arms, polluting the air with unasked or unanswered questions. It was too much for either of them to bear – both speaking simultaneously before realizing themselves and stopping. “You go,” Kikumaru opted immediately, shyly glancing from the corner of his eye at Oishi.  
  
Collecting his courage was like trying to grab a handful of seaweed – it was slimey, slippery, and escaping his grasp. Even if he could get a good grip, it would just yank up from the ground, leaving him only with a leap of faith – a leap he chose to take. “Eiji, I think we need to do something about the attraction we have to one another – it’s making us awkward as friends, and even more so as tennis players.” He was aware of the cherry color of his ears and the way his eyebrows had crept up far enough to touch his hair. “I think my attraction for you is just manifesting itself… oddly.”  
  
Immediately, Kikumaru cut in. “You’re probably right – raging hormones. Right, Oishi?” He wore a carefree grin – a telltale sign he was anything but free of cares. “Maybe we just need to get it out of our system and be done with it?” His voice edged with urgency, his body leaning, whether consciously or not, toward his partner.  
  
The very thought made Oishi’s stomach do acrobatics to rival Kikumaru, but there might be some sense in the words his partner spoke. Even if not, it was ridiculous to spend practices contemplating the shape of Kikumaru’s body or the way he smelled. It had to be hormones. Hormonal attraction.  
  
Natural, physiological  _chemistry_. Nothing more.  
  
There was nothing awkward about the way their hands found a surface to cling to as Oishi pushed Kikumaru back to the bed, pressing his lips into his partner’s; wet whips of red hair tickled the tip of his nose and brushed his eyelids as he tilted and adjusted to deepen the kiss.  
  
Kikumaru had been practicing, or something – it was how it seemed. Though, thinking about it, Oishi himself felt much more comfortable than he had before, the small, scary first step of the kiss – the first kiss – long since out of the way. He really had no idea what he was doing; a thought lost somewhere between the hand on his torso and the other unbuttoning the buttons of his jersey.  
  
Some small part of him was yelling to him that they were going to be late to the closing ceremony if he did not get his arm back from under Kikumaru’s body or his fingers untangled from the boy’s hair; this voice was drowned out by the much stronger force of attraction – lust – chemistry.  
  
Minutes passed – it felt like minutes passed, anyway. Oishi was almost certain it was no longer than a handful of seconds they were tangled together, but each moment divided and multiplied until the clock’s slow tick moved ever more slowly. Oishi became aware of the breath he shared with Kikumaru when their lips parted – of the small string of saliva that held on for a moment before snapping under the pressure of a heavy exhale.  
  
Kikumaru had been right about one thing; it was infinitely relieving to have that kiss “out of his system.” However, neither of them could have predicted the heart-stopping moment their eyes opened and met from too close.   
  
Oishi was certain he had stopped breathing.  
  
 _A deck of cards lay scattered across the sheets of the unused bed, the remains of a frustrating game of solitaire that had been given up on when one of their fellow tennis camp members had plummeted from a staircase. Returning to the room, neither occupant cared to attempt to gather the cards or make the bed useable – both were exhausted and already dressed in their pajamas, so they simply slipped wordlessly back into bed.  
  
The older boy reached for the light beside the bed, turning off the small lamp before settling in on his back, getting his head in just the right nook in the pillows that it would be comfortable. He had just found his niche when he felt a warm arm drop over his abdomen and someone breathing on his ear.  
  
The redhead always slept on his side—that moment was no exception. Oishi tilted his head slightly back toward Kikumaru, habit above all else, feeling his partner’s hair brush the end of his nose. This proximity – this closeness that was only allowed at night between them – was comfortable and familiar.  
  
A knock on the door startled them both. The first to draw away was Kikumaru, allowing Oishi the space to sit up and turn on the light. Kikumaru also sat up, but remained in the bed as the other half of the Golden Pair padded barefoot across the room to the door and answered.  
  
“I’m sorry to bother you so late,” Fuji was wearing blue pajamas and carrying under one arm a book. “If you two aren’t sleeping already, I was hoping to talk to Eiji before bed.” The boy had that look on his face that told Oishi that it was really none of his business what Fuji had come for – it did not stop him from feeling just a bit uncomfortable that the other third year student so nonchalantly came in the middle of the night.  
  
Oishi stepped aside, all the same, welcoming Fuji into the room and followed him back to the beds. He could see Fuji’s eyes pause for a long time over the cards that laid strewn over the bed – still made by housekeeping – before turning his attention to the bed where his best friend sat.  
  
A bed that had been, all to obviously from the turned covers, up until recently occupied by two people. “It will only be a minute, Oishi,” Fuji assured, his eyes never leaving the spot where Oishi had been planning to sleep. “If you could excuse us?”  
  
“Huh? Fuji… what’s this about?” The name whined past Kikumaru’s lips, but his voice was serious; was something going on? He started to get out from under the covers to join Fuji out in the hall, but Oishi held up a hand, halting his partner.  
  
“I’ll go get us some juice at the vending machine – be back in a few minutes.” Oishi grabbed his wallet from the bedside table and left without another word, giving the two friends a moment alone.  
  
It would bother him for months to come that Kikumaru would not tell him what the conversation was about after Fuji left._  
  
Buzzing with pride for his partner – and his school – Oishi almost failed to notice that Kikumaru had been ignoring him since they left the room. Oddly, Oishi felt so much more satisfied and comfortable – he could no longer understand any tension Kikumaru was feeling. Whatever it was, they beat it. They proved to it that they would not be beaten by unreasonable teenaged anatomy.  
  
The little voice in his head sang to him about the small truth he was choosing to forget – that once he had looked in Kikumaru’s eyes, they had kissed again; lightly, almost as a married couple does before the husband and wife part ways for the day. Chaste, but endearing. A kiss that does not say, “I want you.” A kiss that says…  
  
It was pushed aside, however, under the glee that was feeling free of whatever curse had been placed upon him by the kiss Kikumaru gave him. It was hard to continue feeling positive with the situation, considering that his partner refused to sit by him on the bus home and was doing anything but looking at him, but Oishi elected to fill that void with Tezuka.   
  
How he had missed his friend.  
  
As they disembarked from the bus, he began to wonder if he would ever see Kikumaru act normally again – even Tezuka, giving some encouraging speech, was not enough to drown out the nagging voice in his head that had him looking only at his partner as they were dismissed; his partner that was to be temporarily cut off from him in order to play in the international tournament.  _With Fuji_.   
  
What  _was_  that conversation about, anyway?  
  
The mounting fears were shaken and dispelled by a hand sliding over his shoulder and down his arm, the familiar warmth of his partner at his side. This time, there was no wild flare – no impossibly powerful desire to throw Kikumaru against the bus and have his way with the younger boy – just the feeling of a close friend holding tight.  
  
“Let’s go practice together, Oishi.” He smiled – not one of his ridiculous grins, but a more reserved sort of look – a sheepish look. He was apologizing in his own way.   
  
Oishi turned into the touch, his partner’s hand receding to his shoulder. “I’d like that,” he agreed, turning to meet Kikumaru’s eyes from close.  
  
Yes, the insane feeling of lust had been defeated, but something so much worse was eating away at him starting with unimportant things like his toes and his earlobes. He wondered how long it would be before the sensation devoured him whole.  
  
For the moment, he knew it would be a bad idea to vocalize his thoughts – he liked  _them_.  
  
He loved the Golden Pair.  
  
 _Loved…_  
  
\---  
  
Sometimes, when he thinks back on the years that passed without recognizing the obvious signs, he laughs and considers picking up the phone to call Kikumaru. The thought is fleeting. Always he chooses to go back to his tennis and school careers and leave Kikumaru to his memories and daydreams.  
\---


	9. Chapter 9

“You planned this all.”  
  
 _Funny accusation, that_.  
  
It was almost midnight; the neighborhood was eerily quiet in the cool of the night when the summer cicadas were silent. Not so much as a breeze interrupted their conversation under the stars and moonlit trees.   
  
The air was bordering on cold – the resident of the house had wrapped his arms around himself, rubbing his hands over his shoulders to generate friction and, in turn, heat. He wore a loose gray hooded sweatshirt with the logo of some tennis camp stitched into the front over the pocket.   
  
“Watermelons.” He groaned. “ _Watermelons_. I had to drink this horrible medicine because of your watermelon plot.” Re-directing blame was Kikumaru’s specialty, in these situations. If he had not devised his own plot (namely sending his family to the beach while he was stuck at home “sick”), his partner would have been more than happy to give him an excuse to be alone in the house.  
  
The watermelons were actually a ploy to get Kikumaru back for not telling him the Chocolates were coming. Of course he knew about it – his mother mentioned that some radio contest had named Kikumaru the winner, or something along those lines. “You should ask Eiji-kun over,” she had said, “so we can meet the Chocolates, too!” Then she laughed. And laughed. Oishi made for the watermelons and bolted.  
  
“It all worked out okay,” Oishi said warmly, pretending to not hear Kikumaru’s complaint. He wore his Seigaku jacket – grabbing it as the only convenient warm piece of clothing on his way out the door. When Kikumaru had called him, he said it was an emergency. Perhaps this was payback.   
  
The redhead grumbled incoherently back to Oishi’s words in a whisper. In his whiniest of voices, he complained, “You know, the more you say that, the less I believe it, Oishi.” His annunciation of Oishi’s surname had always struck the older boy as a bit odd – so terribly Kikumaru, but odd, nonetheless. “That cake I baked just for them… you said it was Momo's birthday and then everyone ate it and…” He scowled. “You’re just jealous.”  
  
Immediately, Oishi replied, “Yes, I am.” That was a nice name for it – jealousy. Really, it was more that he could not understand why Kikumaru would hide something, no matter how inane, from Oishi. It bothered him even more that his partner would have probably told Fuji, if anyone. It was perfectly understandable, they were close as friends could get, but the inconsistency of Kikumaru’s words when he said Oishi was his best friend and his actions with Fuji felt like cause for concern.  
  
He felt slighted – and, honestly, he could not care less about the Chocolates or if Kikumaru wanted to drool over some young and attractive women, he was more concerned with driving a point home.  
  
“Oishi, you’re mean.” The declaration hardly surprised or offended the addressee. It was the redhead’s next words that did unsettle his partner. “I’m glad, though. I’m glad you’re jealous over me. After all, I’m  _your_  partner.” His voice was heavy on the possessive pronoun, holding the word just a split-second too long.  
  
Whatever Kikumaru was suggesting, Oishi chose to ignore it.  
  
“Did you just call me to complain about watermelons?” A grin worked its way onto Oishi’s face, slowly affecting his partner who could not help but beam in return. “You did just call me about watermelons, didn’t you?”   
  
“Maybe,” the redhead moved a little closer, pressing their shoulders together. “Oishi, you should stay the night.”  
  
“No, I told my parents I was leaving for an emergency. It will be suspicious if I call them now to say I’m staying over.” He leaned back against Kikumaru. “Besides, aren’t you supposed to be so horribly sick that you can’t go to the beach?”  
  
“I’m not too sick to be with Oishi.” Words that normally would have been whined slipped from Kikumaru like a heavy exhale, breathing past Oishi’s ears whimsically. How was he supposed to take those words? The obvious double-entendre made him a bit nervous, shifting away from Kikumaru slightly, but the feeling of being wanted left him warm in his core – the events of that day (both his doubts and convictions) long forgotten.  
  
The older boy lingered there a few minutes more before bidding his partner farewell for the night.


	10. Chapter 10

The low-tread soles of his shoes slipped precariously on the rain-soaked pavement, but he paid it little mind, running headlong into his exhausted but smiling partner. The younger boy was clearly surprised, almost losing his footing, but in the end held them both up, folding his arms around the other half of the Seigaku’s Golden Pair.   
  
“Oishi,” said second half murmured, leaning his forehead against his friend’s shoulder. “I can’t breathe.” He hardly sounded distressed – the utter lack of distress in his voice almost made it sound as though he did not want to breathe at all. His ribs were still expanding, despite the constriction of Oishi’s arms, so clearly he was just exaggerating, anyway.  
  
Oishi really could not explain what had come over him, but he was the first of the Seigaku regulars to catch up with one of their teammates after the tournament – it had taken a lot of running in the freezing rain that came down as though God was weeping with joy for the Japanese team. Even if Kikumaru was not victorious, they had won – and Kikumaru put up a masterful fight.  
  
He was not letting go – he was not letting go because his thoughts had come full-circle to the same thought that had sent panic to his stomach and thundering heart earlier that day. Kikumaru did not need him to be amazing at tennis – they were the Golden Pair, but they did not have to be.   
  
Need was sort of a funny thing – there seemed to be two sorts of need. There was the literal sort of need – humans need water to survive – and the proverbial sort of need… the  _I can’t live without you_  need. It was hard to determine what sort of need Oishi was feeling, for it was certainly of the latter, less literal kind, but it felt deep in his soul to be the more literal kind. He was not sure he would ever want to face tennis without his doubles partner, not anymore. Sometimes, he did not even want to face a day without Kikumaru.  
  
So the older boy would have to be contented with hurting Kikumaru in the freezing rain, feeling the heat between their chests burning strong enough to let the frigid cold of the rest of his body fade like a distant memory.   
  
“Congratulations,” whispered Oishi as his partner’s arms tightened around his back in return. “You did well.”  
  
“Yeah, because you were playing with me.” The redhead pulled on Oishi’s sweater before putting his hands to his doubles partner’s chest so that their eyes could meet. Confusion welled up in Oishi at Kikumaru’s statement – he had been in the stands; not to mention, far enough back in the stands that he could not even make out the expression on Kikumaru’s face from his vantage point.   
  
Oishi’s eyebrows drew together, his tongue flicking out over his lips nervously. “Eiji, I wasn’t…”  
  
“You were.” Kikumaru put a hand over his chest, clapping it twice hard enough that it looked painful. “You were right here, Oishi. Playing with me.” The usual grin on Kikumaru’s face was replaced with a very small curve of his lips; his eyes open wide and hopeful. That look was one Oishi had seen only once before – the last time Kikumaru was asking him to be his doubles partner for the first time.  
  
His heart twitched and fluttered a moment before beginning to beat steadily and painfully in his chest. Every heavy thud felt like being punched in the stomach; despite that, his expression mirrored Kikumaru’s. “I thought you were doing fine without me,” Oishi murmured, fighting back a strange instinct to touch Kikumaru’s face. He couldn’t believe they were still touching at all.  
  
The redhead let out a nervous bark of laughter, sounding himself as though he was not sure whether to bolt or to not move a muscle. Once again, despite all attempts otherwise, they had slid themselves into a horribly awkward position. Or, perhaps the real problem was that it was not awkward at all.  
  
“I need you to play doubles,” Kikumaru murmured. “You know it has to be you. You’re my…” He paused, blinking. “I… um. I don’t know what you are.” His cheeks were red, his eyes diverting somewhere over Oishi’s shoulder as he pulled away in one jerky motion.  
  
Though a little surprised by the sudden mood swing from his partner, Oishi tried to keep smiling. “Partner. I’m your partner.”  
  
Kikumaru’s lips turned up again. “Yeah.”  
  
The word  _partner_  had two meanings to Oishi, much like the word need. The first meaning, the meaning that had always been true for the two of them, was the kind of partners like the kind that played doubles. In that sense, Kikumaru could be partners with anyone on the team even half-capable of real doubles play. The second meaning of partner was someone who was a second half, a completion, or a counter-part. That had been the part that they had been so utterly horrible at establishing.  
  
Every day, Oishi was stuck doing the vice captain’s work after practice. There were, of course, days when Tezuka would wave him away, saying he could finish things. Those days, Fuji would stay behind and walk with Oishi part of the way home or offer him a ride home with his sister. The days that Oishi was stuck at the school late, he often just walked with Tezuka, enjoying the comfortable silence they could share.  
  
Tezuka was so very different from Kikumaru. His family was so very different. His moods were so very different. Altogether different Tezuka was a nice vacation from his usual routine, but it had caused plenty of problems for him with a supposedly wounded Kikumaru.  
  
Despite the fact that Oishi and Kikumaru had found common respect, there was no common ground or common goals between them. Nothing drove them to ever be on the same page, and whenever they became truly frustrated with one another, they could never talk about it. Always their arguments only ended once Tezuka had verbally beaten sense into Oishi and Fuji had let Kikumaru cry or swear all the bad feelings out of his system.   
  
That was their problem. They never spoke; they never worked anything out. It was a quality between them that would never be entirely repaired. Real partners would communicate – they would never let one lag behind the other.  
  
“Eiji, I can’t play doubles without you, either. That means you must be my partner. You complete the Golden Pair.” Oishi continued, trying to raise more of a reaction from Kikumaru, but the boy only looked more upset, the ghost of a smile fading into a frown that quivered as though holding back some other emotion. “Eiji… What…?”  
  
“You’re an idiot, Oishi. Nothing but a big idiot!” Kikumaru was very suddenly looking right at him. “Don’t you…” He threw his arms in the air in frustration. “Never mind.”  
  
Were they fighting again?   
  
“No, don’t ‘never mind’ me, Eiji.” Oishi took his partner by the shoulders. This was the problem – they could not really be partners if they did not look to one another to solve there problems. This was not about Tezuka or Fuji – it was not about burgers after practice with underclassman or the duties of the temporary captain – this was about the Golden Pair. The Golden Pair that had problems Oishi did not even know about or understand.  
  
“You don’t get it, Oishi! I wanted to win – I wanted to win for you, for  _us_.” His eyes were glassed over and threatening to drop tears. “But I didn’t put out my best effort – I didn’t want to win if you couldn’t be there. I didn’t want to win without Oishi. I hardly even  _tried_ , Oishi. I didn’t even…” He shook his head. “You were playing with me in spirit, but I need you more than spirit. I need you a lot more than spirit, but you don’t  _get_  it. You don’t get  _anything_.”  
  
Oishi pulled away sharply like fingers from a hot plate. “I… I don’t know how I can understand it if you don’t explain it to me…” He swallowed hard, knowing somewhere deep down in his soul, or possibly just his intestines that were nicely tied in a knot, he understood everything and he was just choosing not to understand.   
  
“You don’t need me,” the redhead murmured. “That’s why you don’t understand. I’m not really your partner.”  
  
“I just said – Eiji, weren’t you listening?” His own temper was starting to grow. Since when had Kikumaru been such a defeatist? It was frustrating that his partner was growing more and more distant from him the harder he tried to hold the other boy close to his heart. It was frustrating that no matter what he said, he was in the wrong. It was frustrating that his whole body screamed with agony as he tried to dislike Kikumaru, because there was not even one bone in his body capable of ill will toward the younger boy.  
  
Kikumaru’s head was shaking furiously. “It’s not the same, Oishi. You aren’t…”  
  
“It’s the same,” Oishi interrupted immediately. “What I’m feeling is the same. I know it has to be, because we’re always thinking the same thing, right? That’s what you told me to do; so we must be thinking about each other the same way, too.” Or maybe it was just that they were both so irritated with one another – irritated to tears – and over the same three words. Their reactions, though manifested differently through different people, were really the same.  
  
“Oishi…?”   
  
 _Kawamura settled onto the bench in the locker room across from Oishi. Outside were the sounds of Inui and Kaidou continuing their practice match, but the room was otherwise conspicuously quiet since Kikumaru had gone with Momoshirou and Echizen to get burgers. Not long after they announced their intentions, Fuji opted to also go with them. He said something about it being Sunday – something about Yuuta, whatever that meant.  
  
With his racquet thankfully packed away, Kawamura’s disposition was much gentler. He wore a pleasant expression as he worked on loosening the laces of the shoes he intended to wear for work, already dressed for the sushi shop. “Dad asked me to work the day shift, today. I bet it’ll be busy.” Easy conversational tone – that was what Kawamura was so precious for. He was absolutely irreplaceable just for that.  
  
“I’ll walk back with you – I don’t have plans for today,” offered Oishi, lacing his own shoes, noting that his hair was falling in his eyes. It was only his bangs that were long and left forward, but they would have to be cut before they became a real nuisance. He blew straight up, managing to shift the hair but not move it enough for it to be out of his eyes entirely.  
  
To his surprise, when he lifted his head, Kawamura looked concerned. “You know – that’s fine with me, but I thought you would be doing something with Eiji…” He was done fiddling with his own shoes, leaned back on the bench.   
  
A hollow pong of a strong serve echoed outside, briefly splitting their conversation.  
  
“Ah, I’m sure he’ll get in touch with me, eventually. We’ll be okay if we don’t see one another for a day, though. It’s not like we’re truly inseperable…” Whatever it was he was saying, it was only making Kawamura look more and more troubled. As far as he could tell, he had not said anything wrong. “Taka-san… did I say something…?”  
  
The brunette perked, waving his hands in front of himself dismissively. “No, not really. It’s just that… well, I don’t mean to be rude, but I thought that you and Eiji were… _close _.” The way he spoke the last word held all sorts of connotations beyond the literal denotation of the word; when he said close, what he really meant was intimate – closer than Oishi was with any of the other Seigaku regulars.  
  
It was true, to be certain, but Oishi was not necessarily dependant on Kikumaru… right? “I guess I am used to him being around… it would be weird if he ever decided he didn’t want to see me.” It had been weird, the one time they had been in a massive argument over something tiny – when Kikumaru had acted weird around him. They had not talked about it, though… they never really addressed the problem.  
  
Partners were supposed to share everything, were they not?  
  
“I guess it really isn’t a new day without Eiji,” admitted Oishi. “He’s always there… whether it is an email or a phone call or I run into him on the way to school, he’s always there in the morning.” It was, perhaps, for the best that he omitted that many a time it was that Kikumaru was sleeping beside him, and the first face that he saw in the morning.  
  
The expression on Kawamura’s face had become relieved – infinitely more so than it had looked before. He wore his usual goofy smile, typical pleasant Kawamura. “I think you should tell Eiji that. I don’t think he knows.” Kawamura stood, collecting his things, and gave a bow to Oishi. “I’ll walk by myself – you should go join them at the burger place.”  
  
Oishi smiled. “I will, Taka-san, thank you.”_   
  
He would find his friends spread across two tables – Eiji already studying hard for his entrance exams that were months away. That day, he did not tell Eiji. He had plenty of chances after that day, and he would not take them.  
  
He chose to seize the moment as they sat in Oishi’s living room, sipping tea to warm up from the rain they had stood around stupidly in. Oishi had thought to tape the tournament – it was nationally televised – and Kikumaru had instantly wanted to watch parts of the tournament again, plopping down in front of the TV on the couch.  
  
The house was empty – there was a note from his mother that said that they had gone out shopping and that he could eat if he got hungry, since they would be home after the normal dinnertime.  
  
Tezuka had stepped in on their argument earlier in the day; all the emotions from before were drained away in the course of surprise and embarrassment. It left Oishi feeling numb, but at least Kikumaru was acting like his usual self again, shouting things at the TV as it showed him “lies” about his match with the American pair.  
  
“Hey, Eiji.” Oishi touched his partner’s arm, startling the boy enough that he could snatch away the remote and stop the tape. A blue screen with the word “stop” in white letters lit the room oddly, the room quiet enough for them to hear each other breathing. “Sorry to interrupt, but there’s something I want to tell you.”  
  
Kikumaru grinned. “No problem. What’s up?” He settled back on the couch at an odd angle so that their knees touched despite the fact that they were not sitting side-by-side.   
  
In some distant part of his mind, Oishi wondered if there would ever be a time when that sort of contact would not make him feel warm. Would there ever be a time when he could just casually brush legs with Kikumaru without becoming very aware of the other boy? Did other people experience that feeling? He could not honestly say it ever really happened to him with anyone else, so he did not know if it was just a normal reaction or not. Physical human contact, after all, was a fairly normal thing to crave.  
  
It was probably ill advised to explain to Kikumaru that this had been brought to mind because of Kawamura, so instead Oishi explained, “I was thinking a while back – back when you first told me why you were studying so hard – about how important this partnership is to me.” That was not an entirely brilliant way to start either, judging by Kikumaru’s immediate recoil as though he expected to be slapped. That only made it harder for Oishi to keep the confidence to speak. “I… I was thinking that you… sort of… are part of my day. I mean, I can’t have a new day without you.”  
  
Judging from Kikumaru’s expression, Oishi might be the one preparing to be slapped. His partner had the expression of a woman who had just been called “sweetcakes” by some unwelcome offender. Kawamura was wrong – he never should have said anything.  
  
“I never should have said anything,” Oishi muttered, vocalizing his thoughts.  
  
“You should have told me sooner,” corrected Kikumaru, leaning forward and resting his hands over Oishi’s thigh. “That’s what Mom calls unconditional love, Oishi. Unconditional love is when you always want someone in your life, every day.” It was not exactly the definition of the term that Oishi had known before, but it was a nice thought – and a wonderful description of what Oishi felt.  
  
“Are you saying…?” The older boy began to speak, but his partner cut him off abruptly.  
  
That hopeful look returning, Kikumaru asked, “Do you love me?”  
  
Oishi could only stare back, his jaw and lips working like a prize bass, wide and slowly opening and closing without making a sound.   
  
He was choking – that was his heart in his throat – and he was pretty sure his palms were sweating. That was a strange place to sweat. And oh  _god_ , Kikumaru was moving closer. His body was so used to this motion, now, that it acted without his will or consent, pulling Kikumaru toward him and touching their lips lightly together.  
  
Oishi did not have an answer for Kikumaru, but it seemed as though his body did.  
  
He had to say it – he had to find those words within himself or he could not really call himself Kikumaru’s partner. They were so terrible at communicating, it was no wonder that fits of suppressed passion – fits of love – had only been able to come out in angry words and deep kisses.  
  
Words scared him. The couch in his parents house, two boys tangled in the dim blue glow of the TV screen; that scenario did not even thrill him, but his stomach sank at the very thought of all those words he was going to have to discover and learn how to use.


	11. Chapter 11

The day Oishi decided it was time to act was the day even Echizen had something to say.  
  
“You know… Oishi-sempai…” He sat with his knees spread lazily, his elbows rested over his knees. Unlike his upperclassman, he did not wear his warm-up pants over his shorts; though that day would have been ideal for the pants. With the freak weather they were having, Oishi half-expected it to snow.   
  
Then again, Echizen was taking his turn in lecturing Oishi. It had been going on for a week – apparently the private moment between Kikumaru and himself after the tournament had been anything but private: the whole team (including, regrettably, his underclassman) had seen the tail-end of the argument that trailed off into what was meant to be a truly secluded moment.  
  
The trouble with privacy was that it could never exist within a sports team. When a group of boys saw you take off your shirt and pants to change every day, it was achingly difficult to hide things like making googly eyes at one’s partner secret for even a small amount of time.  
  
So far, Inui’s lecture had been the worst – Oishi wondered if he would start hemorrhaging out the ears in embarrassment before Inui reached his conclusion. It was both a massive relief and ever more a terror that Kaidou had inadvertently been drawn into the conversation, not fairing much better than his mortified upperclassman.   
  
The alarming statistics Inui had drawn up on his relationship with Kikumaru would haunt his dreams for weeks to come. His bespectacled friend claimed it was for the sake of gathering data on the Golden Pair… frankly, Oishi was under the impression that Inui was just as much of a gossip as Kikumaru. If anything could be learned from the first time Tachibana Ann proposed a date with one of the Seigaku regulars, it was that all of them had over-active imaginations… Inui was no exception.  
  
The freshman tennis prodigy held the bill of his cap in the fingers of both hands, keeping it hovering just over his groin as he bowed his head away from the sun. It was not very bright – a thin fog had settled over the courts almost an hour before when practice began. Echizen was unmindful of the cool air, instead intently focusing copper eyes on the inside of his ball cap.   
  
“Can I ask you something, sempai?” His voice always held a certain sort of lazy drawl to it that made him sound perpetually bored with everything. In the time Oishi had known Echizen, he had never seen the boy truly riled (though they had a few near-scrapes) and was not entirely certain he could even know what would get his underclassman upset.   
  
There was no need to answer the rhetorical question and Oishi was almost certain, the sort of certain that felt like swallowing a knife that Echizen was going to inquire into Kikumaru. Though his youngest teammate normally had a way of staying out of things entirely either by apathy or ignorance, with the horrors Oishi had faced in the span of a few days, a few pigs flying would be nothing too upsetting.  
  
Still Echizen stared into his hat, never looking at his temporary captain. “It’s about Captain Tezuka,” he explained. His fingers flipped his cap, loosely pressed between his palms. It was a bit of a relief that it was not another inquiry into Kikumaru, but at the same time Oishi was not certain he could answer a question about Tezuka – not to any satisfaction, anyway.  
  
It became clear in the silence that followed that Echizen would not continue with the question – was he embarrassed? Oishi prodded him forward. “What about Tezuka?” Copper eyes drifted away from the baseball cap for a moment, looking to Oishi’s shirt collar but never up to his face before drifting away again.  
  
“He has kept in touch with you.” This was the strangest question anyone had ever asked Oishi… it totally lacked in any actual question; it was just a series of statements. “You two are friends.” At least they were accurate statements – Oishi nodded silently to each one, but that was terribly ineffective when Echizen would not even look at him.   
  
A smile naturally coming to his lips as his comforting instincts kicked in, Oishi said softly, “Yes, he and I correspond regularly through email.” The second half of Echizen’s statement kicked in – the fact that Oishi and Tezuka were close. It was another truth, but it yanked a memory back to the forefront of his thoughts; a memory that he had worked hard to suppress entirely.   
  
Fuji, he noticed, had a strange way of weaseling his way into Oishi’s thoughts – whether it was creating a nervous tension with Kikumaru by having a secret conversation in the middle of the night or haunting Oishi’s thoughts by leaning in close to Tezuka, sharing an alarmingly gentle kiss with the captain. Neither Tezuka nor Fuji seemed the type to even be capable of such a gentle kiss.  
  
Then again, when had Oishi become the type to pin his doubles partner to his parent’s couch and kiss the boy that made his heart alternately skip about erratically and cease to beat entirely?  
  
Attempting in vain to cover his internal reaction to his distracting thought process, Oishi asked too-quickly, “Is there something you wanted me to say to Tezuka for you?” The smile on his face was now strained – twitching at the edges as if it might fail him entirely at any moment.   
  
“No,” Echizen finally did look at Oishi – his expression completely unreadable. “Oishi-sempai, what is your relationship with the captain?” With a great deal of reluctance, Oishi accepted that he knew where this question was going. He could hear Echizen’s next words ringing in his head like the strike of a gong; words that were never spoken as they were blissfully interrupted by the person who was just about to become the topic of conversation.  
  
“O-i-shiiii,” the second half of the Golden Pair bounded up, grinning like a loon. The panicked state of Oishi’s heart went ignored in favor of glancing over his partner, dressed in his street clothes. “Momo-chan and Fuji want to go to out to eat – you should come.” Any small amount of excitement Oishi felt at the invitation was immediately quashed by Kikumaru turning to the youngest regular and ruffling his hair, unprotected without the cap. “Shorty should come, too!”  
  
“…Yes,” Echizen replied in accented English, replacing his cap on his head as Kikumaru attached himself to Echizen’s shoulders.   
  
It was time to act – the whole team had said something, even Echizen. Even Kawamura. Even, to the horror of Oishi, Inui. However, he had made a promise. “I’m going to visit Ryuzaki-sensei,” replied the elder half of the Golden Pair apologetically.   
  
Responsible Oishi. Caring Oishi. Oishi that was too slow to dodge as Kikumaru changed his target to fold around his partner instead of hanging on to Echizen. “Oishi…” The name was all too easy to whine out in that childish voice of his – really, the name lent itself to whining. It had the perfect combination of vowels. “You should enjoy your youth,” complained Kikumaru, “that crusty old woman will be fine if you don’t see her one day!”  
  
 _What if she isn’t?_  Honestly, Oishi was not worried so much as he did not like to abandon people at the hospital. He had developed the habit long ago with Tezuka, hanging close to the boy’s side through more visits than he could count.  
  
The light kiss Kikumaru brushed over Oishi’s ear out of Echizen’s line of sight was indeed enticing, but he had already resolved to see their coach; they were going to go over the plans for the new practice regimen that Inui had suggested. “Later,” he barely managed between sluggish lips. “Let’s do something later,” he added with slightly more conviction moving his head away from Kikumaru to try to catch his eyes.   
  
The redhead looked disappointed. “My family is having a movie night together – I won’t…” He paused. “Unless you want to come over for family night!” The playful grin on the younger boy’s face was troubling – certainly he knew that Oishi would never impose on family time… but it sure did not look like it.  
  
It went against his very nature – he was too polite and too fixated on not stirring up a tradition or guideline. As the case was with all people (boys of his age especially) he was quite capable of damning all rules and regulations and just acting on his own, but usually he was pushed to it. Normally, it was in the height of emotion or in an emergency situation.  
  
It perplexed him greatly that he said, “I’ll think about it.” It was not an out-right “no.” It was almost certain that Oishi intended to decline, but he was less sure that he would remain steady in his convictions were he to be prodded gently by Kikumaru.  
  
“That’s not a good answer!” Kikumaru gripped at his partner roughly, nearly tackling him into Echizen. “Give me a real answer, Oishi! You sound like Fuji!” At that Oishi laughed, enjoying for a few brief seconds more his partner’s warmth against his body.  
  
 _Hospitals were dull and unnerving things. It was the walls that bothered him the most – the consistency of the almost-white walls that reflected back into the room gray, deathly light. It was like fog hanging over a funeral – a baby cried, hushed by his mother. A man was sobbing, another infinitely relieved. A young child held a blood-soaked cloth over one knee, being guided back to the ER for stitches.  
  
The waiting room was really the worst part of the hospital – there were countless magazines that Oishi could not even care to pick up, a water-cooler that had been two thirds empty every time Oishi saw it and a group of people that always looked the same. Different people. Different stories. Always the same en masse.   
  
It was the winter of his second year at Seigaku; his mother excused him from classes – called him in sick – so that he could spend the day at the hospital. It was a wretched concept, that. It would be a small wonder if their teacher did not notice the conspicuous absence of both Tezuka and Oishi.   
  
The day before, Fuji had looked at him with such hard eyes – Kikumaru yelled at his partner for being too serious. This was important to him, though – it did not matter to him what those two thought, Oishi had to be with Tezuka. It was just a routine checkup, he knew, but he had to be there with his friend. He felt partially at fault; a guilt that was inexplicable but strong.  
  
“When I’m in the hospital, you don’t visit me!” The complaint from Kikumaru echoed in Oishi’s brain as he waited, staring at the gray wall ahead of him, trying to make out even the smallest imperfection in the paint or stain that would distinguish that wall from the monotony of the walls around him.  
  
“You’ve never been in the hospital since I met you,” he had replied with a chuckle, though his eyes drifted nervously back to Tezuka who was still playing his practice match against one of the freshman – Momoshirou, was it?  
  
“Oishi-kun,” he was brought out of his thoughts by the nurse who had come to know him in the past year – they spoke every time Tezuka was in the hospital, after all. “Tezuka-kun is looking over the x-rays with the doctor, if you would like to go back.” Oishi nodded dumbly to her suggestion, letting her guide him out of the chair and down to the familiar ward and familiar room that practically had Tezuka’s name on the door.  
  
When he entered, Tezuka was not wearing his shirt, standing with arms folded over his bare chest in his pants and socks. The doctor put the x-rays over a lighted board to display to Tezuka what the damage to the arm looked like; as usual, his words were of warning and disdain.  
  
“…As you can see, Tezuka-kun, you still…” he paused as Oishi entered the room. The doctor put on a smile. “Oishi-kun, welcome.”  
  
“Good morning, Doctor.” Oishi gave a small bow, hardly more than a nod of his head, and went to stand beside Tezuka, looking over the x-rays with him. Without pause, the doctor began to give the same speech they had both heard a millions times before – the arm was not healed, it was not even close to being back to normal, and it would never heal if Tezuka did not tone down his tennis play.  
  
The familiar words were drowned out entirely when Oishi realized Tezuka’s eyes had fallen on him, stoic as ever through thin-framed glasses. It was not unusual to fall under Tezuka’s scrutiny, but more so when they were off the court. Tezuka usually looked ahead and up – reaching forward – rarely fixating on one person for very long.   
  
There was something in those eyes Oishi did not understand… Tezuka almost looked sad that Oishi stood dutifully at his side. It was the position Oishi had chosen to take, and it was a place he did not intend to abandon; maybe that was not what Tezuka wanted…?  
  
“Oishi-kun, you’ll have to keep an eye on him,” the doctor said with good humor in his voice. He turned off the lights behind the x-rays. “Remember, your next examination is in two weeks,” he added to Tezuka who had given up on his scrutiny of Oishi in favor of finding his shirt.  
  
“Of course,” Oishi promised lightly. He would watch over Tezuka as long as it took._  
  
“Echizen asked about you, today,” Oishi commented, flopping across his bed with his arms above his head. He held the cordless phone with his shoulder, too tired to even put his fingers around it. The day had been long – the visit to the hospital had ended up as a trip to the grocery store with Ryuzaki’s granddaughter where they ran into Echizen and Momoshirou. From there, they somehow ended up at the bowling alley where Oishi was told to both pay and keep score – he was too good to play with them, and he was their upperclassman so he was supposed to pay.  
  
Or, so he was told.  
  
There was a healthy silence on the other end of the line – the natural pause of an international call as well as his friend’s probable bemusement at the comment. “Echizen?” As usual, the boy did not ask what had happened, just echoed back his surprise. He knew Oishi well enough to know that the vice captain would offer up any important information.  
  
“I never really got to the root of it,” Oishi lied – he knew what Echizen really meant to ask, had Kikumaru not interrupted. “Eiji interrupted us.” The mention of the name reminded him that he had never actually called Kikumaru to formally decline the invitation… then again, he had never not said “no” to such an invitation in the past, so there had never been the need to call before.   
  
“How is Kikumaru?” Tezuka spoke the name so flatly, but the curiosity from him was unusual – he probably really meant to ask, “How are things with Kikumaru?” However, Tezuka had more tact than Oishi usually gave him credit for.   
  
Honestly, Oishi could not be certain of the answer to either question. In the case of the first, Kikumaru seemed to be happy and normal enough, he just had become more physically attached to Oishi in the past weeks. As per the second, that question was impossible to answer. There was the horrifying thought running in his mind that he could find himself committed to a relationship with Kikumaru; that the thought was not totally repulsive and even, in some small way, very attractive.  
  
There was then the equally terrifying thought that he had already committed to a relationship with Kikumaru in the long-term and that he had been long before the thrilling first kisses and nervous but excited flutters of his heart.  
  
“I… it’s fine.” Oishi quickly amended, “He’s fine.” He knew that his false cheer and his obvious Freudian slip would not get past Tezuka. The day that something did slip by the captain would be a very cold day in hell indeed.  
  
There was a heavy pause over the phone, and Oishi could hear some commotion on Tezuka’s end of the call. “I have tutoring,” said the captain bluntly. His next sentence pulled Oishi abruptly back to the subject at hand. “You need to tell him about your decision for university. You won’t be able to attend the same high school if you want to reach for that dream. You know that.”  
  
\---  
  
 _Whispered promises in the rain under an umbrella. Tezuka speaking hopeless words and open-ended promises. Oishi making vows and skin touching tentatively before they realized there was nothing uncomfortable about Tezuka and Oishi. Tezuka and Oishi._  
  
Pulling the sparse airline-issue blanket over himself, Oishi tried not to remember similar whispered promises to Kikumaru. He tried to forget the intentional chasm that divided between them, as though the earth split beneath their feet.   
  
It was his fault. He got on that plane. He was the one who abandoned Kikumaru, still, even after all that had happened.  
  
 _Oishi sitting quietly on his bed. Wind beyond the window whipping wildly by, whispering wishes he had yet to make. Whispered promises over the phone that night – whispered to Tezuka long after he hung up._  
  
“I will, Tezuka. I will when I know how.”


	12. Chapter 12

Time passed with Tezuka would never feel like time wasted – in the quiet, strong company of his captain and close friend, Oishi always felt as though he was cheating Tezuka… getting the better end of the deal.   
  
The clock ticked mercilessly forward marching toward the sunset as they regarded the same slip of paper they had been so intently regarding for nearly three hours. Oishi’s hand had made a perminant red print on his face from leaning against it, and his mouth tasted moldy from being ignored by a toothbrush since morning – the two cans of soda had been a bad idea – but it was hot in the classroom and vending machines kept things so cold.  
  
He was certain Tezuka had not actually moved for at least an hour; his hair glinted gold from the setting sun at his back and he cast a most peculiar shadow across the table – like an angry spider looming over his prey.   
  
It was not until Oishi realized he could no longer see Tezuka’s sharp eyes behind glinting glasses that he knew that his eyes were actually closed, his cheek slipping from its perch in the crook of his palm so his hand covered his ear instead. He tried to straighten, opening his eyes, but he knew there would be a massive red mark on his cheek from where he had been resting his head.  
  
Tezuka was now very intently looking at him. In that hour of not moving, he had not spoken or looked away or, as far as Oishi could tell, blinked. He looked red-eyed and about as tired at Tezuka would allow himself to appear, but it did not stop a thin thread of amusement from cording through his voice. “Oishi, you should go home and rest.” He sounded stern, but the faint hint of a smirk on his lips suggested otherwise. He had to be tired, himself, to be so outwardly expressive.   
  
The vice captain covered his mouth while his diaphragm suddenly expanded drastically causing him to give a long yawn that brought tears to the corners of his eyes. No sooner had the yawn finished than another bit at its heels – that was the trouble with giving in to a yawn. Dangerous things, yawns.  
  
“I’ll stay as long as you d…” he was cut off when his mouth, against his will, opened wide enough to cause his jaw to pop, tears welling anew in his eyes as his hand snapped up just a second too late to save him from being rude. “…As you do,” he reiterated when he once again had control of his breathing.  
  
With a very small shake of his head, Tezuka pushed his chair back. “I’m going home.” The abrupt change caught Oishi off guard. Was Tezuka…?  
  
His mouth was opening again in a yawn. It made him think of the brief interlude in which Kikumaru became convinced he could make Oishi yawn if he just spoke the words enough times. Inevitably, it was discovered that it was actually Kikumaru that would yawn on command – any time the word was spoken to him.   
  
Attempting a smile, this time not cut off by a yawn – thankfully – Oishi lifted the paper from the table, storing it in his schoolbag at his side. “I’ll call you in the morning,” he suggested. “We can talk about this some more, then. But, I think that once we run our ideas by Ryuzaki-sensei, we should be able to construct a lineup – ultimately, it’s her decision. And you know, three heads are better than one.”   
  
Tezuka gave a curt nod as he stood, spreading his hands palm-flat on the table. “You’ll see me at practice, tomorrow. You should call Kikumaru.” The statement would have come from leftfield were it not for the fact that it seemed Tezuka, unlike his teammates who attempted to be subtle, was being his usual blunt self about the matter of the Golden Pair. “You don’t have much longer. You know that schools will be scouting during Nationals. You know what you want to study.”  
  
Giving a heavy sigh, Oishi lifted his bag over his shoulder. “He is determined, Tezuka. I don’t think the Golden Pair is going to be split up so easily.” He had already resolved to act – no one needed to tell him, anymore, that he needed to do something. The problem was the prospect of actually saying it. Saying things they both knew he was thinking, anyway.  
  
“You’re going to hurt him; you don’t want that.” As always, Tezuka was speaking in absolutes, leaving no room for argument. His hands lifted from the table, finding the pockets of his tennis jacket instead. “You are more devoted than anyone gives you credit for – you care more than the rest of us combined.”  
  
At the last statement, Oishi’s insides twisted into a neat knot, his lips parting against his will. He was cemented in place, else he might try to challenge Tezuka’s words – or, at least, contribute his own praise for his captain. If anyone was determined and resolute, it was Tezuka. Perhaps that was not quite the same as devoted, though? It was a small distinction, but Tezuka was not the type to choose his words flippantly.  
  
“I think Kikumaru deserves to know he owns you.”  
  
The strong verb finally drew a sputtering protest out of Oishi. “Tezuka, you’re going too far! I’m not – it’s not like…” He stopped, a frustrated breath escaping him as something slightly more powerful than a sigh – a silent growl. “I need him. That’s it. I just can’t… he’s important.”  
  
“He’s  _vital_.” Tezuka walked past Oishi, their shoulders brushing as he did. “You promised me you would follow me no matter what to realize our dream; and I believe you. I don’t know what you promised Kikumaru, but it is something much stronger and much more permanent.” Oishi turned to follow his captain out the door; powerless against the continuing lecture his captain gave.   
  
“You don’t play tennis because you enjoy the game,” continued his captain. “You play because you love people – you love doubles. You love the dynamics, not the mechanics.” His voice took on a sharp tone. “You win for other people – for me, for Kikumaru, for Seigaku – you are the heart and soul of this team. It’s why you’re vice captain.”   
  
The anger in Tezuka’s voice confused Oishi. It was almost as though he was talking about one thing and thinking something else entirely. “You can break your promise to me, you know,” said the captain. “You can set your own goals – have your own priorities. You don’t have to do something with your life just because of me.”  
  
“I’ve already decided,” Oishi replied lamely. They were at the exit of the school building, and it was only a few blocks before they would split ways, anyway. “I intend to honor that promise for my own sake, as well. I couldn’t do anything to help you, then, and I won’t let that happen again. I can’t very well support you if I’m unable to do so much as save you from giving up your dream entirely. I don’t want something like what happened to you or to Fuji happen again. Kiriha—“  
  
“You are always behind me, Oishi.” Tezuka suddenly turned on a heel, catching Oishi by the shoulders. “Always. But, I’m not the only one.” His eyes were dark, strangely out of proportion from the prescription of his glasses. Oishi knew the prescription was strong – and stronger in his right eye. He had been with Tezuka to get a new prescription.  
  
He could only nod dumbly, relief rushing through him like a glass of lemonade on a blazing summer day when Tezuka released him. “It’s a nice view,” he said jokingly, getting a glare in response from Tezuka, but it was worth it. It was worth it because Tezuka seemed to understand that he did not have to say anything more – Oishi understood.  
  
“Yo,” both of them turned, surprised, to the gates. Leaned against the brick wall, wearing a pair of shorts and a polo, was Fuji. He was not looking at Oishi; his gaze focused intently on Tezuka. The captain only stared back for a moment before shaking his head. “You didn’t answer your cell.”  
  
“I don’t have reception in the school.” It might have been Oishi’s imagination, but Tezuka looked unsettled, like a cat whose fur had been rubbed subtlety the wrong way. He gave a nod to Oishi. “We’ll talk again tomorrow.”  
  
“Yeah.” Oishi smiled to Fuji and Tezuka in turn, knowing well when it was simply none of his business. “See you tomorrow.”  
  
 _It was raining – neither of them had the foresight to carry an umbrella, but neither felt compelled to run despite the rain that now clogged every bit of clothing from their underwear to their shoes, making their bodies uncomfortably heavy and their feet let out a squish-splash with every step on the flooded pavement. Gently, Tezuka cradled his left elbow in his right palm, his eyes intently fixed on his steps while Oishi just fought to keep his eyes open; his natural inclination was to close them against the cold and the rain.  
  
He had been thinking about it since it happened – thinking about what he would not give to undo the damage that had been done – to make Tezuka whole again so he could properly pursue his dream. He was not the only one… he could see the way that Fuji would look at them both the mornings after they had both been absent for another trip to the hospital.   
  
Fuji was just burning to beat Tezuka in a fair fight – or even to lose to Tezuka. He had no other rival; none other he worried would actually best him; none other that he would put any effort into beating.  
  
It was for Fuji’s sake, too. Though, when it came down to it, it was Oishi’s own selfish nature. He did not like people to suffer – he would give an arm and a leg to help someone in distress. He had made his decision long ago, speaking casually with Tezuka’s doctor as well as his own about the possibility. He asked them about what he should study, what his grades needed to be, what he should look into for part-time jobs…  
  
“I need to swear this to someone,” Oishi said suddenly, clasping the waterlogged sleeve of Tezuka’s good arm. “Because if I don’t, I might break the promise.” It had to be Tezuka – Tezuka would not let him stray from his promise, right? Not serious, resolute Tezuka.   
  
The other second year regarded him from behind oval glasses, nodding to the demand his classmate suddenly made of him. “I will become a doctor, Tezuka. I don’t want to be helpless again.” If the notion surprised Tezuka, he hid it masterfully, just nodding again.  
  
“You’re aiming high,” said Tezuka as he began to walk again, dragging Oishi with him inadvertently. He did not seem to mind that the hand was still on his arm. “That’s an honorable goal.”  
  
“Eiji told me I should aim for the world.” It was still a bit odd to use Kikumaru’s first name – even now that they had known one another for a little under a year, it just did not seem quite right. It was just Oishi’s proper upbringing kicking in. “So I’m aiming for what I want the most.” He grinned, non-plussed by the fact that Tezuka did not share his elation.  
  
The other second year suggested, “You should make the promise to Kikumaru – he’s your partner. Partners work together toward goals.” Tezuka’s logic made perfect sense, but somehow it was something Oishi did not want to share with Kikumaru just yet – or anyone else. This promise was for himself and Tezuka… for now.  
  
“I owe it to you to tell you first,” he explained, releasing Tezuka’s sleeve and putting his hands in his pockets.   
  
Tezuka immediately countered, “You owe it to Kikumaru to tell him.”  
  
The silence that followed was not as comfortable as it should have been. “Won’t it ever stop raining?” Oishi finally wondered to fill the gap stretching between them, though he honestly did not really notice the rain anymore._   
  
It was almost nine when Oishi finally arrived at his door just to encounter the most unexpected thing on his stoop – it was dressed in an over-sized pullover sweatshirt and shorts. It had red hair and seemed to be fast asleep, sitting hunched over its own knees.  
  
“Eiji,” the name was spoken loud enough to rouse the redhead at the doorstep as Oishi sat beside his partner, letting his bag slide off his shoulder. “You shouldn’t sleep outside; you might catch cold.” Without thinking, his arm fell around Kikumaru’s shoulders, pulling himself against his partner.   
  
It would never be cold if Kikumaru was at his side – it just was not possible.  
  
With the same ease as Oishi had put an arm around him, Kikumaru was leaning back into his partner, his head easily finding its niche under Oishi’s chin. “I wasn’t planning on sleeping. You were supposed to be home three hours ago.” Had he really been waiting for three hours just for Oishi to get home? Did Oishi’s parents not tell Kikumaru he had called to say he would be late?  
  
Why did Kikumaru neglect to just call him and say he was waiting? Perhaps he thought Oishi would not come… and, in this case, it might have even been true. He did feel horribly for the way he had been wrapped up in Tezuka for a few days… or, basically since the captain had returned from Germany. In the same stroke, however, the few moments he and Kikumaru had together were infinitely more intimate – there was no longer any need to shy away from touching or staring just a little too long.  
  
It was because Oishi accepted fully how he felt about Kikumaru – it was an unfortunate and dangerous position. Perhaps being all too happy to apply words to the inexplicable, Kikumaru had enthusiastically declared it “unconditional love.” The desire to be close – to always care – to always feel the small nervous spark of elation that ignited a fire in his chest that sometimes was like a slow burn or a dying ember, but was all too often a raging conflagration of uncontrollable, spinning thought and sensation.   
  
The scary part was that the more he lost himself to the wiles of the inexplicable, the more he just wanted to go back and do it again – to lose himself, the definition of himself, to the overwhelming blaze of Kikumaru.   
  
The oddest part was that outwardly, he felt no different. He still had the urge to be a mother hen, blurting out, “Did you have homework?” before he could stop the words. It was not exactly that he felt he was responsible for looking after Kikumaru, but if he was going to accomplish his own goals – to chase his own dreams – he wanted Kikumaru to come with him. And, in order to come with Oishi, Kikumaru would have to work hard… he promised to work hard.  
  
“I had Chemistry homework,” replied the younger boy, twisting as he spoke so that he could wrap one arm across Oishi’s stomach, curling completely against his partner. “I was thinking – we’re sort of like a molecule.”   
  
Slowly, an eyebrow rose over one of Oishi’s eyes, a bemused smile touching his lips. “What molecule are we, Eiji?” His hand drifted lower, finding its spot around Kikumaru’s waist while his other hand continued to hold them up. A nagging voice in the back of his head told them they should not be doing this out in the open, but it was late and dark – no one would notice them. Of course, if they did, Oishi would have to move to a different planet where he would not have to face his mother once the gossip made its way around.  
  
He seriously doubted his mother would be upset, per say, if she knew that her son and Kikumaru were… well, whatever they were. But, like Oishi himself, his mother was the type to coddle those she cared about and stick her nose into other people’s business with the best of intentions – she was slightly less likely to know when enough was enough, unfortunately, than her son.  
  
“We’re water.” The mischief in Kikumaru’s voice could not be missed. His fingers tightened on Oishi’s shirt as his head moved as though to nuzzle closer to the skin of Oishi’s neck. “Normally, we’re liquid – but we can also boil and freeze.” He spoke the words as though it was such an accomplishment, and it only served to make Oishi more amused.  
  
“Who’s oxygen?”   
  
“Obviously Oishi! ‘O’ is for  _Oishi_!” Kikumaru’s other hand had found its way to the back of his neck, brushing against the shortest of black hair and sending an uncontrollable shudder of pleasure down Oishi’s spine. “And I’m Hydrogen – because with my acrobatic skills, it seems like there are two of me.”  
  
The skeptical eyebrow crept higher on Oishi’s brow. “I see. So, we’ve bonded, and I’m Oxygen and you're acrobatic Hydrogen.” He could feel Kikumaru’s head bobbing in minute acknowledging nods against his chin, shifting curly red hair that was going to be a mess after all the friction.   
  
“And… When you think about it, I’m mostly made of water – and so are you. So… 70% of me is you. And I’m 70% of you.”  
  
Oishi let out a bark of laughter, leaning forward and gathering Kikumaru in his hands so that he could push the boy away enough to look into his eyes. “Eiji, I love you.” It was amazing how easy those words were to say through laughter – when the love he was speaking of was the love of feeling joyful; he loved that Kikumaru made him feel like smiling.  
  
He loved that it could be sub-zero and he would never know because of the warmth Kikumaru made him feel somewhere that no one ever talked about feeling emotions – as though it came from his very soul.  
  
His partner’s eyes were wide – he did not seem to know what to make of the words Oishi had just spoken; if he should take them as flippantly as they were said or if he should think more of it. Unlike Oishi, however, he did not like to think through things – his face was full of frustration seconds later.  
  
“Hey, don’t say things like that if you don’t…” He trailed off as Oishi’s hands found his cheeks. The rough edge of the bandage on Kikumaru’s cheek under Oishi’s left palm was a silent reminder of the real reason he loved Kikumaru – because Kikumaru was Kikumaru and no one else. “O…Oishi?”  
  
“Eiji, I love you.” He somehow managed to sound confident despite the fact that his stomach was trying valiantly to craw out his throat, clawing away at his esophagus.   
  
Next thing he knew, he was at the bottom of a pile of limbs on the porch, under the insubstantial weight of his partner. “Shut up, you idiot. I know.”   
  
His first kiss with someone he was newly declared in love with was very much like his first kiss. It was wet – almost unpleasantly so – but there was desperation behind it, this time. As though layers of cotton, and even skin was too much standing between them. It may have been sloppy, but for then, it was the only means they had to cease being separate people – Oxygen and Hydrogen – and form a new pair; a new sort of element entirely.  
  
Now that Oishi had managed to say the words aloud, there was a whole sort of new and terrifying flame between he and Kikumaru. This one he was not as certain he could contain for any period of time. But, why would he want to?  
\---


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is just a little side-story. More tide-over chapter goodness until I can work on this again. You don't need to read this chapter to understand the rest of the story, and this could probably stand alone as a one-shot.

As always, Oishi was the first to rise; or, he would have been if he could safely detangle himself from Kikumaru. The first day of the Nationals, the very last situation in which Oishi would want to be late, he was lost in watching Kikumaru sleep. For a long time, all he could think of was the arching curve of his partner’s upper lip or the subtle warmth of one thin and painfully pale arm.  
  
It was an overwhelmingly stupid feeling – being in love. He had never felt so braindead in his whole life.   
  
“Don’t be mad at me,” he whispered to the unconscious Kikumaru, brushing his lips over the redhead’s temple. “You need to get up, or we’ll be late.” His eyes were closed, unable to move his face away from Kikumaru – taking in the smell of his partner’s hair. It smelled unshowered; it smelled like sweat – Kikumaru sweat.   
  
He could feel the redhead stir; Oishi knew before he felt the hand on his cheek that Kikumaru was moving to touch him. Naturally his head declined to meet Kikumaru’s unspoken request, their lips touching, eyes closing.   
  
That odd sort of intimacy – intimacy they could have achieved the many times Kikumaru stayed the night – felt so normal. There was no time before Kikumaru kissed him good morning. There was no time before he could wrap himself around another warm body and lose himself for a few minutes in that warmth.  
  
They learned to be gentle when they kissed – drawing out each sensation as though they had all the time in the world, never pressing too hard or rushing though the motions.   
  
Oishi’s fingers found his partner’s hair, winding around curls that in turn snaked around his digits, clenching his hand between Kikumaru’s head and the pillow. The younger boy’s hands laid palm-flat on Oishi’s back on either side of his spine, his last knuckle clenched so slightly that Oishi could feel fingernails dig into his skin. Were the nails even a millimeter longer, it would have been painful.  
  
He had learned that Kikumaru would happily take the lead – he would show with his body where he wanted Oishi, and Oishi was happy to oblige; sometimes, like that particular morning, all Kikumaru wanted was for Oishi to not move.  
  
They were going to be late if they did not move, however, so Oishi fought the clamping knuckles of his partner’s hands, lifting away from Kikumaru carefully.  
  
“Nationals,” Oishi murmured. “We’re finally there, Eiji.” His free hand brushed rouge bangs from Kikumaru’s forehead. “Let’s show all of Japan what the Golden Pair can do.”  
  
Kikumaru gave a small nod, a grin breaking out across his lips, spreading to Oishi’s face like an epidemic. “No one can beat the Golden Pair, now,” whispered Kikumaru in return, lifting off the mattress enough to press his lips to Oishi’s throat very briefly. “We’ll beat them to a pulp.”  
  
“Eiji, let’s make a deal.” Disengaging himself from his partner, Oishi sat up properly, pushing hair out of his face. “Some sort of incentive to be victorious at Nationals.” He had his plan in mind for two weeks – two weeks of planning and attempting to get reassurance out of Tezuka. Two weeks of emotionless stares and non-committal noises.  
  
He had been planning it because now that he had learned to use one definition – love – he was growing fond of them. Things seemed less confusing when there was a definition for things. Scary, true – dread sat heavy in his stomach at the idea of changing anything about the Golden Pair. However, in the same breath, he could wish for nothing more than to allow the relationship to evolve and to begin to make sense again rather than hanging in a painfully wonderful and confounding limbo.  
  
“Huh? What’re you thinking, Oishi?” Kikumaru was still tired – his words slurred noticeably together, his awkward pronunciation of Oishi’s surname feeling evermore awkward. “Blood oath, or something?”  
  
Oishi laughed. “No.” He added a moment later with good humor, “You’ve been playing too many video games, I think.”  
  
A pout formed on the lips that consumed so much of Oishi’s attention; Kikumaru was not actually hurt – he would throw a childish tantrum, were that the case. He was just trying to provoke Oishi; this tactic did actually work on some of Seigaku’s other regulars, just not the war-hardened Oishi. Were dealing with Kikumaru a war, that is.  
  
“Hey,” whined the redhead a little too loudly – Oishi’s ears were still over-sensitive to sound in the early morning. “How am I supposed to know what you’re thinking? You’re crazy enough to think of something like a blood oath, you know. You and Fuji – you’re both crazy.” There was that name, again – it was always awkward for Oishi to hear Fuji’s name come up in intimate moments… moments when Kikumaru should not have been thinking of Fuji.  
  
Oishi was just thinking too hard. Besides, he was guilty of having his thoughts stray toward Tezuka – frequently, at that. He just kept the thoughts to himself. Furthermore, knowing Kikumaru, he was probably thinking a million things at once… he probably could not even keep track of himself. It would not surprise Oishi if his partner suddenly brought up food at any second.  
  
“I was thinking,” said Oishi, “if we succeed in Nationals… let’s…” He could not find a way to say it without sounding ridiculous. People asked things like that all the time, right? Why should it be so hard for Oishi? “…Let’s change the Golden Pair a bit.” How wonderfully vague.  
  
Kikumaru, understandably, looked perplexed. “Oishi, you don’t make sense.” That was also understandable. “I think maybe you need to get some coffee before we go to the tournament, today.”  
  
The tournament.  
  
The  _tournament_.  
  
Oishi threw off the blanket, springing to his feet. “The tournament! We’re going to be late!” By late, Oishi meant “ten minutes early,” which was  _very_  late by Oishi standards.   
  
The plan, for the moment, was forgotten as Oishi hastily gathered his uniform to get changed.  
  
Behind him, in the bed, Kikumaru drifted back to sleep.


	14. Chapter 14

Words they spoke that morning quickly faded as the reality of the situation set in; Oishi and Tezuka stood with their heads bowed together talking quietly about the lineup – a lineup that had one giant, glaring flaw.  
  
“Taka-san and Fuji,” suggested Oishi quietly, his hand reaching over the paper and landing on the doubles two spot. “Fuji may be invaluable in singles, but if we look at our opponent, I think we need Eiji for singles two.” He sighed. “We should ask Ryuzaki-sensei.”  
  
They had been agonizing over it for hours the day Oishi had finally managed to tell Kikumaru his feelings – Tezuka and Oishi knew before anyone else that the Golden Pair would not be playing in the Nationals.  
  
The staged match; the 6-0 utter defeat Oishi suffered at the hand of his captain. Kikumaru had not been pleased – placated only by gentle words, tender kisses, and unfortunately the staring eyes of their teammates in the locker room when they were discovered. The redhead had not whispered a word of the argument since then, more busy fending off the wild questions of the underclassman.  
  
They almost were back to normal until they actually reached the arena.  
  
 _“Oishi – you’re… you really aren’t going to be behind me…” The words were whispered to Oishi’s back; he could feel them blow across the flesh of his neck, unable to penetrate the thick skin he had attempted to don in light of the inevitable reaction from Kikumaru. “…If you’re not behind me, I’ll never play doubles. Not ever.”  
  
Oishi remained carefully still; it took every ounce of willpower within him to not turn around and comfort his partner – it would have been poor form, anyway, with so many people surrounding them to see… Tezuka waiting for them to gather somewhere beyond the gates. “Eiji, it’s only for a couple games.”  
  
With a quiet sob, Kikumaru threw himself against Oishi’s back, nearly tackling the older boy. Thin arms held tight as iron around Oishi’s waist as he could feel the warmth of Kikumaru’s forehead inbetween his shoulder blades. “Oishi, I hate you,” the words were whispered without force or meaning, but it created an uncomfortable tension beweeen Oishi’s ribs. “I hate tennis.”  
  
“You love tennis.” Oishi’s head hung forward. “Look, it’s only for a couple games.”  
  
“You promised, Oishi! You’re…” Whatever protest Kikumaru had, it was sobbed into the cloth of Oishi’s jacket and forever obscured.  
  
There was a small pause while Oishi struggled out of Kikumaru’s arms, gently coaxing his partner to turn around, hugging Kikumaru from behind, instead. “Behind you; I’m still behind you, like this. You told me you could play with me even if I was not on the court because I’m here.” One of Oishi’s hands moved over Kikumaru’s jacket to rest over his heart. “And I’m always there, Kikumaru.”  
  
“But… Nationals…”  
  
“Our aim was the world, remember?” It was funny how that world he spoke of seemed to disappear around them – how he did not even notice Hyotei’s starters entering; the knowing look exchanged between Atobe and his teammates. He did not notice the families gathered with their sons, wishing them luck. He did not notice the officials, the spectators, or the coaches. For a moment, it was just Oishi and Kikumaru.  
  
Just the Golden Pair.  
  
“The Golden Pair can already win in the Nationals – we know that, Eiji. We went last year; no one needs to tell us. We don’t need to prove it to them.” His lips fell on Kikumaru’s nape, just below thick red curls. “We need to support Seigaku, now. We need to support Tezuka, Fuji, Taka-san, and Inui – this is our last chance to play together in a tournament like this; let’s not just show them the acrobatic skills of Kikumaru Eiji of the Golden Pair, let’s show them the formidable force of Seigaku’s seniors!”  
  
One of Kikumaru’s hands lifted to clasp around Oishi’s carefully, as though he did not want to damage the fingers. “Oishi, I won’t play doubles if it’s not with you…” His head tilted back, resting against Oishi’s shoulder. “But I won’t lose as long as you’re with me.” He snickered, drawing away from Oishi. “Heh – that was cheesy, right? But, it’s true, so don’t laugh!” His expression was a confounding adorable mix of stern, embarrassed, and amused.  
  
“I’m not going to laugh.” Oishi took both Kikumaru’s hands in his own, smiling at him gently; recalling their unfinished conversation from earlier that morning. “Eiji – if you…” He paused, correcting himself for the sake of avoiding another fit from Kikumaru. “If we win today – if the Golden Pair emerges from Nationals victorious, let’s…” Again came the strange difficulty of the question. He really should have asked someone more knowledgeable about how to go about it.  
  
It was so easy for Tachibana Ann… maybe too easy for Fuji.   
  
Kikumaru made a nonsense noise of confusion – Oishi could only guess his face looked silly contorted with thought and doubt. “I’m… what I want to say is…” This should not be so hard. “I think… you and I… we need to change us. You know, to make us… an ‘us’.”  
  
The redhead was staring at him as though he was totally off his nut. Though, realization thankfully began to spread across Kikumaru’s face; his eyes widening and lips parting very slightly. “Oishi, are you asking me out?”  
  
“Failing at it, yes.” The older boy chuckled nervously, knowing full well his cheeks were flushed.   
  
“Oishi, the Golden Pair won’t lose!” The look in Kikumaru’s eyes was one of stone-cold determination; this Kikumaru really could not be defeated. “We’ll win, and you can be my boyfriend!”  
  
A few of the people nearby turned their heads to Kikumaru’s exclamation, solidifying the decision to find a rock as soon as possible under which he would hide until everyone who could ever embarrass him was long gone. “E—Eiji, not so loud.”   
  
Eiji giggled and stuck out his tongue, his faith in tennis apparently renewed._  
  
It was not as though he was not aware of the eyes on him. He had felt them since the match began. He wondered if Tezuka had seen even five consecutive seconds of the match, or if he was too busy staring at Oishi. If that was not bad enough, Fuji had disappeared entirely since Kikumaru started losing; though, his partner was on fire, now.  
  
He recognized easily himself in Kikumaru’s backcourt play – it was almost like watching one of Inui’s tapes of the Golden Pair playing, only oddly missing half of the pair. It did not seem to matter how Kaida hit the ball, or where, there was always Kikumaru there to return it.  
  
“Eiji,” Oishi murmured, his voice carrying no further than Tezuka before it was swallowed by the hollering crowds.   
  
“Do you regret it?” Oishi shook his head to the question, never once looking at his friend as a smile spread across his face. To his surprise, Tezuka’s hand fell on his shoulder, though only as a brief touch before the captain’s hands returned to his pockets. “We won’t lose, Oishi,” said the captain. “Kikumaru will clench our spot… but even if he did not, I’ll win.”  
  
“I trust you,” replied Oishi earnestly, nodding again before turning his attention back to the match.  
  
He had two promises to keep – the one he had made to Tezuka; the one Kikumaru had helped him fulfill up until the Nationals. The second promise had been made to Kikumaru, and Tezuka would help him keep that promise as well.  
  
They would not lose. Not the Golden Pair – not Seigaku’s captain and vice captain.   
  
“Match; Seigaku’s Kikumaru. Seven games to six.”  
  
 _When Oishi left the sidelines, originally, it was to try to find where his partner had gone to warm up, and with little success. He ended up wandering the complex: passing teams that were unfamiliar to him – catching the tail end of Fudomine’s Kamio-Ibu pair trouncing their opponent. He noticed the Fuji family, minus his classmate, standing together near one of the courts; Yuuta looking uncomfortable while his mother and sister were asking an official for directions… or so it appeared.  
  
Watching them instead of where he was going, he managed to collide head first with another person aimlessly wandering by the courts – nearly toppling them both over.  
  
“I’m so sorry,” Oishi bowed. “I should watch where I’m going. I’m sorry.” He bowed again, not daring to lift his head to se who he had collided with this time.  
  
“It’s okay, vice captain.” That voice…? Oishi’s head snapped up, his eyes fixing on the rugged, very masculine face of his former tennis captain. As always, a pair of sunglasses shrouded the older boy’s eyes, and he wore his school uniform with the jacket off his shoulders, his hands lazily resting in his pockets. “Shouldn’t you be playing with that strange kid?”  
  
That strange kid, of course, being Kikumaru.  
  
“Captain Yamato…” Straightening his regular jacket, Oishi shook his head. “Eiji and are aren’t playing doubles anymore.” The words were lies, though of Eiji’s invention. They would play doubles again – just as soon as Oishi was able. His hand clenched subconsciously.  
  
Was this what it felt like to be Tezuka? Was this why Tezuka and Fuji always acting like that around one another? Was it… was it two halves of one greater whole – a set of rivals or an unmatched pair – could not peacefully coexist separately.  
  
It only strengthened his resolve. He would study medicine – he would study sports therapy – he would help the Tezukas of Japan… of the world. He was aiming for the world. With Kikumaru.  
  
“…Or so Eiji says,” tacked on Oishi miserably, remembering the brief moment in the lobby area when he thought everything might be okay, after all – everything but his pride after half of the attendees heard Kikumaru declare Oishi his future boyfriend.  
  
The former Seigaku captain rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Sometimes tennis isn’t about tennis and doubles aren’t about doubles at all,” said Oishi’s upperclassman before a bright grin broke out across his face. “Then again, sometimes tennis is just tennis and doubles are just doubles!” He laughed.  
  
Sometimes… Yamato was insightful, and sometimes he was just Yamato. Oishi wondered which it was that particular time – was he trying to convey some deeper meaning to Oishi or was he just… being Captain Yamato.  
  
“Of course, Captain Yamato.” Of course._  
  
“Did you see how I dove for that one shot! Oh – the look on his face. And then… Oishi! You aren’t listening!” Kikumaru flung himself at Oishi’s arm, latching on and pulling his partner sideways. “I dove like this, remember?” The enthusiastic redhead pulled them both sideways, staggering, and nearly colliding with a couple of spectators.   
  
“Excuse us,” Oishi said to them before being dragged away by the victory-drunk Kikumaru. “Eiji, you’re going to…” He stopped as Kikumaru whirled on him, suddenly, pushing them into a space between the main building and one of the practice walls, a thin alley that was open to the sunshine on both sides. “Eiji…”   
  
 _“Hurry up and get better soon, Oishi. Singles are lonely!”  
  
The redhead thrust his hand in the air, Oishi slowly, but certainly, returning the gesture from the stands followed by a wild scream.  
  
Golden Pair._  
  
He let himself be held against the wall – Kikumaru was still charged with adrenaline from the match, sweat still dripping from the very tips of red curls and making his hair feel like wet straw. The zippers of their jackets clinked quietly as they moved against one another, their bodies melding together easily.   
  
 _“…Singles are lonely!”_    
  
But sometimes, tennis is just tennis. Doubles are just doubles.   
  
Sometimes Kikumaru Eiji is just Kikumaru Eiji – not half of the Golden Pair, not a tennis player, not a student, not a son, not a lover, not a partner – just Kikumaru Eiji.  
  
Just Kikumaru Eiji.  
  
“Eiji,” Oishi put a hand on Kikumaru’s chest, pushing his partner away, still winning a small, short kiss of defiance from his partner. “Listen. I need to tell you something. Before you agree to be with me or to win here at Nationals for the Golden Pair, I need to tell you this.” One hand was in Kikumaru’s straw-coarse hair, the other wrapped around his partner’s back.   
  
“Hm?” The endorphins were still pumping through Kikumaru’s system – Oishi could see it in the certain sparkle in his partner’s eyes. Those eyes, he thought, that watched him so intently as though to memorize the shape of the spiked bangs that hung too-long over Oishi’s forehead or the way that his nose was slightly crooked from when he had smashed it on the pool wall when trying to learn to turn around underwater.  
  
Taking a deep breath, Oishi explained, “I plan on studying to be a doctor. It’s why I’ve been working so hard in school; I want to get into a high school that is particularly noteworthy for academics… it’s not easy to get into medical school, and I want to build a strong foundation, now. I really want you to come with me, for this, Eiji. But… If I can’t… I mean, I’ll understand if you can’t tie yourself down to an academically rigorous school.”  
  
Though, left unspoken, it would be the worst possible thing Kikumaru could do… to not understand Oishi. He had to have faith that, like Tezuka, Kikumaru would support him toward his dreams, like any real partner should.  
  
His partner had been silent for a long time, looking down at their feet. When he spoke, his words were just as much of a shock as the sudden breach of quiet. “I know, Oishi. Fuji told me everything. That night when he asked to talk to me alone – he told me about it.” Wait… Fuji knew, too? “Tezuka told him because he was worried you would never tell me.” The redhead turned his head up to regard Oishi seriously; the expression was strange on his face. “Why didn’t you tell me, Oishi?”  
  
“I just…” The older boy was going to defend himself – to tell Kikumaru that he just had told him. That was not really the problem – why had Oishi waited? “Because I made the promise for Tezuka,” he said a bit lamely. “But, I didn’t really understand why I made the promise… I thought I wanted to just help people like Tezuka, but really, I want to help people like me.”  
  
He gave a small smile. “Eiji, you’re being selfish, but so am I.”  
  
“ _Selfish_? You’re the bastard that…” Oishi hushed his partner with two fingers over Kikumaru’s lips.  
  
The vice captain continued, “I have been thinking that this is all my fault – taking on the guilt for your pain like I always do. Trying so hard to make you happy to ease that guilt… but the real reason I want to work hard toward this goal is not to help people who love the game, but people like me who love people like you who love the game. I feel like such an idiot… Tezuka tried to  _tell_  me.”  
  
The redhead looked a bit skeptical at Oishi’s explanation. “So, all I have to do is work a little harder, right?” He looked away, his face displaying anger, but Oishi’s guess was that it was actually sheepishness.  
  
Something in Oishi’s chest fluttered like rapidly flapping wings. “Yeah, and I’ll work harder at tennis.” He leaned forward, kissing Kikumaru just behind the earlobe, a bit of hair stuck between his lips and sweaty skin. The redhead leaned into the caress, a moment before taking a step back, his trademark grin spreading across his face with a low, devious chuckle.  
  
“Fist Nationals, then entrance exams, then the world!” He held out a hand, and automatically Oishi clasped it – the way they had so many times after winning a point together on the court. Those two hands, Oishi thought absently, had been made to clasp together.  
  
All young men wanted to rule the world – especially boys like Kikumaru. Oishi thought, though, that Kikumaru just might be able to do it; he just might have the determination and insane, inexplicable stamina for that sort of thing.  
  
That is, as long as Oishi was always close behind him.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is borderline NSFW.

“Eiji, you’re being…”  
  
“Don’t say unreasonable, Oishi – that’s such an old man word. Unreasonable.  _Unreasonable_.” The way the redhead spoke the word, it sounded a lot less like unreasonable, and a lot more like something that would be condemned somewhere in the ten commandments. “I’m not being unreasonable, Oishi, so what am I being?”  
  
The older boy gave a heavy sigh. Ever since he had failed to call Kikumaru that morning to wish him a happy birthday – something he had done with a kiss the moment they met up on the way to school – Kikumaru had been acting… well, totally unreasonable.   
  
“You’re being unreasonable,” replied Oishi, ignoring the low groan from Kikumaru. The older boy let out a small shout of protest as his partner whapped him with the plastic bag he had been clutching tight in his right hand.   
  
Just after practice, Kikumaru ran off without even changing saying that he needed to get something from the convenience store – leaving a very flustered Oishi in his wake. It had been Oishi’s delegated duty to keep Kikumaru busy for at least two hours before bringing him over to the Kawamura restaurant for his surprise party.   
  
Everyone was counting on him, and so far all he had managed to do was lose Kikumaru for almost half an hour before finally catching up to him only to be dragged toward Kikumaru’s house. With any luck, his family would have already left for the sushi bar, and there was nothing to worry about. As it was, he was mostly curious what was so damned important at the convenience store and trying not to fall over himself trying to keep up with Kikumaru.  
  
“You didn’t let me spend the night last night,” grumbled Kikumaru, “and you didn’t even call me this morning. Oishi, you’re a bad boyfriend.” Though he said that, his hand reached out and clasped his partner’s… Kikumaru’s palm was surprisingly sweaty. “I know you saw me at school, but that isn’t anything special. Everyone saw me at school – even  _Shorty_ wished me happy birthday at school.”  
  
Oishi sighed. “Echizen wouldn’t forget your birthday.” Really, Kikumaru was acting as though  _Oishi_  had forgotten his birthday – to be fair, this was his first time having a… A _boyfriend_  for a birthday; he really did not know how one approached the subject properly. Hell, it was his first time having a boyfriend, period… or anyone for that matter. It was not as though they made user manuals for this sort of thing.  
  
He was not going to look at dating advice books, either. Not when it came to Kikumaru. Everything with Kikumaru was fine and natural and normal, it was just a matter of understanding how to let romantic inclinations manifest themselves properly without harming the solid foundation of the Golden Pair.   
  
They climbed the steps to Kikumaru’s door together – the family cars were not in the driveway, so Oishi could only assume that his luck was stronger than he had given himself credit for. Now he just needed to convince Kikumaru he wanted to take him on a date to the sushi restaurant as his birthday gift, and all would be well. That is, if he could convince Kikumaru of anything.  
  
The redhead turned the key in the door and pushed his shoulder against it to open it, discarding his school and tennis bags along with his shoes in the entry way. Curiously, he kept the other bag with him. Oishi also dropped his bags, though neatly to the side of the entryway, and his shoes by the door before following his partner into the house that he knew as though it was his own.   
  
Despite how hectic the household was – and not to mention how full of people – Oishi loved the house; or rather, the home. Kikumaru’s family was many times more level than the youngest son, but at the same time all shared a particular  _playfulness_  about them. It was a nice departure from Oishi’s family; everyone in his family was serious and calm… maybe that was why he had grown to like Tezuka and Tezuka’s grandparents so much.  
  
The whole family also spoiled Kikumaru rotten – they all loved him and babied him like he was still a young child. In some ways, Oishi thought it was a bad thing that they treated him like the center of the universe (he began to think of himself in that light). Sometimes, though, watching how much the family loved their youngest member, it just made Oishi feel warm and comfortable – he was just like these people; he felt the same way.  
  
“Eiji, where did you…?” He trailed off as he got to the foot of the stairs; Kikumaru’s bedroom door was open. He must have gone upstairs to get changed. That was a good start; Oishi would have liked a shower, himself, but he would have to go as-was for the sake of keeping the secret they had been working on so hard for nearly a month. In fact, much of tennis practice (though it had been more lazy, anyway, since the end of Nationals) had been spent plotting.   
  
And running many laps for slacking off – during those laps they could continue to plot, however. Tezuka and Kikumaru were going to be the only two not in Olympic athlete shape by the Christmas.  
  
When there was no response from Kikumaru, Oishi carefully began to climb the stairs. “Eiji, are you getting changed?” He was at the top of the stairs before he had a response.  
  
“C’mere, Oishi,” called back Kikumaru. There was an odd, trembling quality to his voice – he sounded almost frightened. Instantly, worry flared in Oishi’s chest like the sudden ignition of a match… or in his case, more like a blowtorch. He took longer strides, getting to Kikumaru’s door and rounding the corner of the wall into the room to be met with Kikumaru still wearing his tennis uniform flopped on his stomach on the bed. His cheeks were flushed, his mouth hidden by his arms crossed in front of his nose and under the back of his head.  
  
For a moment, Oishi wondered if he had ever seen Kikumaru before. The heavy droop of his eyelids and slightly flattened red curls could only hold his attention for so long before he was looking at the shallow arc of Kikumaru’s back and thick, athletic thighs that trailed into thinner calves and white ankle-socks. He had to be doing that on purpose – no one was that easy on the eye by accident.  
  
“Is something wrong, Eiji?” Even as he spoke, the redhead was patting the bed beside him, beckoning Oishi to his side. Without second thought, Oishi joined him on the bed, sitting on its edge beside Kikumaru’s ribs. He could feel his partner’s arm looping around his waist, though his attention was still fixed on now exposed flushed cheeks.  
  
He could only hold Kikumaru’s gaze for a handful of seconds before Kikumaru averted his gaze, staring at Daigorou that watched them with curious glass eyes. “Oishi, I know about the party.” He… he what? “I figured it out when you guys were talking about it during practice. They asked you to keep me distracted, right?”  
  
It was no use pretending – surprise parties usually were not a surprise, anyway. With a sigh of defeat, Oishi clasped the hand over his lap and smiled at his partner. “Yeah, something like that. I was going to pretend to ask you on a date to Taka-san’s dad’s place. We’re supposed to be there at eight.” His other hand went to Kikumaru’s cheek, half-expecting it to be hot from the way Kikumaru continued to blush.   
  
“So, we have two hours?” Kikumaru came to a sit, wrapping his other arm around Oishi and resting his chin on his partner’s shoulder. “And my family is out…” The redhead’s voice dropped lower, his lips brushing over the juncture of Oishi’s neck and shoulders. “Syuichirou…”  
  
Oishi flushed crimson at the name, moving away a little to try to catch his partner’s eyes, finding a similar expression on Kikumaru’s face – bright red, but anticipatory. “Can’t I call you that?”  
  
“I… I guess so, it’s just you never… before, I mean…” He really did not know what he meant – he called Kikumaru by his first name, right? So, why should it be a problem? Especially considering circumstances… it would be weird if Kikumaru continued to call him by his surname. “Just… maybe only outside of school, you know… you understand.”  
  
“Mm.” The noise was only almost a response, more of a flex of the vocal chords rumbling in the redhead’s throat as he pressed his lips to Oishi’s. Any thoughts of propriety or names slipped away as Oishi twisted to properly embrace his partner, his feet dragging away from the floor as Kikumaru brought him onto the bed.   
  
They paused a moment, Kikumaru’s curls spread across the pillow, Oishi’s arms pinned below his partner, holding their chests together. “Sorry I didn’t plan something special for you,” Oishi laid a light kiss on Kikumaru’s brow. “I’ll make it up to you.”  
  
An odd moment of silence passed between them – Oishi found that the inside of his mouth suddenly felt sticky and a bit dry; Kikumaru licked his lips, probably without even realizing he had done it. “I don’t want to go to the party,” said Kikumaru abruptly, his voice sounding too loud to Oishi’s ears. It only then occurred to him that they had been whispering before. “I want to stay with Oishi.”  
  
Oishi was apparently back to being “Oishi” – it was infinitely relieving, though he would never tell Kikumaru as much. It was just too weird to hear his first name from anyone but his family. Though, honestly, he would not want Kikumaru to call him by his surname during…  
  
His ears burned, and he could physically feel the blood in his nose. Oh, god, he should not have thought that. “You like parties,” managed Oishi, though his voice was faulty and anything but steady. Kikumaru raised a curious eyebrow, evidently hearing the same thing as his partner. “And you’ll get to have wonderful sushi… and everyone has presents for you.” His eyelids were falling shut, his voice escaping him as Kikumaru placed a hand on his cheek and brought their lips together again.  
  
Oishi was not really in the mood for a party, anyway.  
  
There had really never been a situation before in which Oishi had given consideration to the spandex shorts his partner wore under his regular tennis shorts, but his fingers found the base of the tight black material and questions popped into his mind. First, why did Kikumaru wear them? Second, would they be difficult to remove after he had been sweating hard during practice or a game?  
  
Or, if he just wanted to take them off…  
  
A low moan dragged out of Kikumaru, one leg bending and holding Oishi down against him. For a wild moment, Oishi could only think of the amazing thickness of the cloth between them and how horribly wrong it was that a few layers of cotton stood between their bare skin. The same thoughts were apparently in Kikumaru’s head – the redhead was undoing the buttons of Oishi’s uniform jacket with practiced ease.  
  
Their lips separated long enough for Oishi to shrug the jacket and sit up to undo his own shirt buttons. He hardly noticed Kikumaru slipping off his socks before reaching for Oishi socks – that tickled. Letting out a small noise of surprise, Oishi’s toes curled, making it harder for Kikumaru to get the cloth off the foot. “Hold still,” said the redhead between giggles, his breath warm and comforting against Oishi’s shoulder.  
  
“That tickles,” complained Oishi, though his lips were drawn in a grin. Whatever he was thinking about his feet was lost as Kikumaru’s hands batted at his, doing away with the last of the buttons of Oishi’s uniform shirt and slipping the shirt from his shoulders. Their lips met only briefly again before Kikumaru moved back to yank off his tennis polo.   
  
There was a soft thud as the shirt landed over Daigoro’s head by the door and Kikumaru settled into the pillow again. As they once again melded together, Oishi could not help but think it was so much better – skin against skin from their waists to their lips, his partner’s hands on his lower back moving over the ridge of the muscle developed from so many years of tennis practice. Kikumaru’s legs were hooking over his again, holding them together, keeping Oishi from moving under Kikumaru’s touch that had traveled down his spine and under the waistline of his pants, between the uniform and his boxers.  
  
A low moan in return echoed back from Oishi. They had been together for quite some time – a certain level of intimacy was normal to them, but Kikumaru had never touched him like that – at least, not lingeringly.   
  
“Pants,” Eiji managed between kisses. “Take off…” His request was swallowed in a deep kiss, his fingers tightening against Oishi’s scalp. Having nothing to grab a hold of, he resorted to pushing Oishi’s head away by the chin. “Please.”   
  
It was alarming, really, how dark Eiji’s eyes had become – eyes that were normally playful, bright blue were a richer blue like the deepest parts of the ocean where the surface bled into the sky at midnight, obscuring the horizon. But, beyond the eyes and the part of his lips and the sweaty skin was frustration that was displayed clearly in the way Kikumaru’s brow creased, shifting red hair that had been caked to his forehead.  
  
“You don’t get it, still.” A sound akin to a growl rumbled in Kikuamru’s throat. “Oishi! After I went and bought stuff so that we could… and you…!” His cheeks were crimson, his anger deflating quickly into embarrassment. “Don’t you want to…?” He let out a short, huffy breath, his head turning sharply to the side.  
  
Pieces were fitting together in Oishi’s brain – the realization of what was probably in that plastic bag hitting him like stepping out into the middle of a busy freeway. Which was equivalent to the subtlety Kikumaru had been practicing without him even catching on – how did he not…?  
  
“It’s not that I don’t…” Oishi’s cheeks flushed, his voice breathy. He was paralyzed… else the thought might have startled him enough to leap from the bed. It was not exactly as though the thought had not occurred to him – like any healthy teenaged boy, the thought had indeed occurred to him at a healthy frequency. It was that the feelings and the relationship added new layers of complications to the… _intimacy_.  
  
He took a deep breath, trying to level himself despite the color in his cheeks. “Eiji, I want to… with you.” Their lips brushed together very lightly – almost imperceptibly. Kikumaru allowed Oishi the room to wiggle away after the kiss and retrieve the bag from the floor. “You really were thinking about this last night, too?”  
  
As he rested back on the bed, Kikumaru nibbled at his ear, eliciting a squeak. “Heh – I’ve been thinking about this for longer than that.” Playfully he tagged on a moment later, “Syuichirou.”   
  
Oishi frowned at Kikumaru for a moment before leaning in for another light kiss. “I would act upset that you’ve been planning how I’m going to lose my virginity without me, but it is your birthday, after all…” He wished he could sound sexy saying those words – somehow, he thought he probably just sounded nervous and uncertain. Wanting Kikumaru – that was not the problem – all the implications of consummating… of going that last scary step into making them officially “lovers,” that was a bit more nerve-wrecking.   
  
Steeling his voice, he murmured words that had become easy in comparison. “I love you.” A smile twitched and faltered on his lips.  
  
His partner wrapped around him once again – there was nothing sexual about the embrace, just the comfort of another warm, familiar body. “I love you, Syuichirou.” The name slipped impishly past Kikumaru’s lips before he began to nibble at the ear that had not been targeted before. “And you’re still wearing your pants.”  
  
A ridiculous giggle escaped Oishi. Would the whole night be like this? Was sex always this… silly?  
  
If it was anything like kissing, he could only guess that the first time would be a little weird, but every time after that would make up for the first. And, as long as it was with Kikumaru, there was nowhere he would rather be.  
  
 _He looks back on it fondly – the first experience of sexual afterglow… or, something like it. He had never been more tired in his life, but the endorphins singing in his brain kept a stupid, sleepy grin on his face as he remained curled in an unceremonious heap in Kikumaru’s bed.  
  
He could feel his partner’s – his lover’s – breath on his neck, even and steady as though he was sleeping very peacefully. The time ticked away on the clock across the room, each second marked with an echoing tick, but Oishi’s sense of time moved with the rhythmic, rapid beat of the heart within the chest that he had made his pillow.  
  
“Oishi,” the word rang out in the room more boisterously than it had actually been spoken. “Party.” Of course – Kikumaru wanted his presents, to see his family and friends, to eat good sushi…  
  
“Shower,” corrected the older boy, lifting his head enough to look into Kikumaru’s eyes. “Shower and then the party.”  
  
Kikumaru shook his head. “Stay here for as long as we can without being late, then shower, then party,” he amended, one hand somehow lifting out of their tangle to find the back of Oishi’s neck. “Don’t move for a while, Oishi.”  
  
“Mm,” replied Oishi, settling back on Kikumaru’s heart.  
  
After half an hour counting on Kikumaru-heartbeat-minutes, they were able to will themselves to the shower.  
  
Sometimes, years later, he still keeps track of time by the beats of Kikumaru’s heart – or how he can remember them without a pale chest to put his ear against_.  
  
Oishi had to admit – Kikumaru did do an astounding job of acting surprised when their teammates and his family popped up from behind tables in the Kawamura restaurant. He bounded around the room, gushing to all of them about how great it was and “let’s eat soon, I’m starved” and whatever other nonsense he could get out of his mouth at a million words a minute.   
  
Still feeling a bit drunk on endorphins, himself, Oishi carefully settled at the table where Fuji, Tezuka, and Kawamura sat together, smiling at them as he did so. “Eiji already guessed it – it wasn’t a surprise. I think he overheard us talking about it in practice.” Immediately, he could see Kawamura look disappointed, turning to Fuji. The latter only looked amused.  
  
Tezuka shook his head, leaning away from Oishi a bit. “You shouldn’t be surprised. When Kikumaru doesn’t have to run laps, he must realize something is wrong.” Though it was delivered in monotone, the rest of the table laughed. Tezuka made a face – clearly he had not meant to be funny, and continued to see no humor in it even after Oishi clapped an appreciative hand on his shoulder and Fuji turned a secretive smile to the table.  
  
“Tezuka…” Fuji shook his head. When he looked back up, his face was a bit frightening – blue eyes narrowed at Oishi like a hawk watching his prey. “So, Oishi, how did you and Eiji pass the time before you came here?” He leaned forward, resting an elbow on the table as his lips formed a Cheshire grin.   
  
Oh – Oishi was not going to fall for that – not at the beginning of a party with Eiji’s  _grandparents_  there. “We went to the convenience store – then by his house. He took a shower, got changed…” Blood was rushing to his face, he knew, but his voice was mostly calm and cool – mostly.  
  
“Mm.” Fuji knew – he had not said anything and already Fuji knew.  
  
Kawamura glanced between the two of them, befuddled. “Did I miss something?”  
  
Adjusting his glasses with a cough, Tezuka interjected, “Some things are best left unsaid, Kawamura.” He glanced at Oishi – the same little look he often would use to catch a glimpse of Oishi watching Kikumaru during practice.   
  
The redhead chose that moment to latch onto Fuji’s back, grinning against his best friend’s ear. “Heh! You planned this for me, didn’t you, Fuji? You’re the best!” He turned his head slightly to acknowledge Kawamura. “Taka-san, too! And all this food! Hee! It’s like it’s my birthday!”  
  
“It is your birthday, Eiji-sempai,” interjected Momoshirou from the next table over.  
  
“The captain, too!” Kikumaru rounded the table as if to throw himself on Tezuka but seemed to think better of it at the last second, latching onto Oishi, instead. “And of course, my Syuichirou.”  
  
The restaurant went silent for a very long second. It had to be the longest second in the history of the world.  
  
“E—Eiji…” Oishi, crimson, tried to back away from his partner, to little avail.  
  
Longer seconds would follow, Oishi would soon learn. Seconds made longer by bliss or a frozen heart – and seconds that dragged into millennia from regret.


	16. Chapter 16

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Oishi dreamed.  
  
He knew he dreamed because when he woke up he was sweating, panting, finding his pants uncomfortably tight…  
  
He knew he dreamed. Sometimes he had nightmares; the worst nightmares always seemed to revolve around his relationship with his partner. A cold sweat down his back, filmy and wet enough to soak through the sheet that covers it, caused the sheet to pull with him as he moved a little closer to Kikumaru. The red head made a noise in his sleep, subconsciously securing himself against his partner’s body. The younger boy’s head tilted back, his lips parted and his eyes still serenely closed.  
  
How could he resist that face? Carefully, gently, Oishi bowed his head, catching his partner’s lips with his own. Their lips stuck, pulled, moved together as Kikumaru was clearly coming to, his arms draping around Oishi’s back. His hands felt warm and dry in comparison to the bare, slick skin they explored. His mouth pleasurably knowing of what his partner needed then.  
  
The clock hit five in the morning. This was not the first night that week that Oishi had not been able to sleep – it was the fifth in a row. During the day, he moves like a zombie – his eyes dark and sunken from lack of sleep, his movements clumsy and under-coordinated.   
  
Sometimes he dreamed that Kikumaru whispered pleading words for him to stay – when he woke up, he would find his partner crying, clenching tight against him. “Syuichirou,” the boy would whisper into his collarbone, his lips brushing skin with fluttering innocence, “Stay with me.” Tears, like sweat, were slick and salty – they tasted almost the same to drink in the heat of passion.  
  
Oishi’s fingers ran up the line of his smaller lover’s spine, causing his partner’s back to arch back, his lips breaking away from the kiss, eyelids heavy as he finally regarded Oishi. “Your parents…” The words started a whisper and ended a moan as Oishi’s other hand brushed fingers delicately over Kikumaru’s inner thigh – a moan devoured by hungry lips.  
  
His dreams had been most haunted, however, by the entrance exams. The exams were finally over, their graduation near on the horizon, but as he waited for his results to get back, Oishi also waited to hear from the high school he wished to attend. The school that had, without reservation, offered a tennis scholarship to the Golden Pair, provided that their academics could match their play. Oishi had come out of his exams feeling about as confident as he could have hoped, but such was not the case for Kikumaru.  
  
The red head refused to talk about it – he went on with life as though they had never taken the test. But, there would be no time for make-up exams to improve their scores; the school Oishi wanted so desperately to go to was a small, private, boarding school… they needed to set up their rooming situation, attend an orientation, and choose their class schedule… it was not the same as school as Oishi had known it since he was a young child.   
  
Of course, he and Kikumaru had decided to ask for a room together, when they got in. If they got in.  
  
The red head’s tongue curled teasingly over the inside of Oishi’s upper lip as they settled into another deep kiss, both moving, as though by the same thought, so that Oishi was on top of Kikumaru, their bodies touching from toes to lips. They had been together since Nationals, and now it was spring – the early rising sun and fresh fruit blossoms silently reminded Oishi that an anniversary sat on the horizon – the Golden Pair’s.   
  
The world moved in slow motion as his magazine about doubles play flew from his hand, skidding across the pavement and threatening to drop straight off the cliff beyond. He watched the smaller boy dive for it, amazed as the small, pale hand closed around the magazine, rescuing it from its certain doom. Then there was that smile – that stupidly bright smile off-set by the bandage on his nose.  
  
And, of course, “doubles-kun.”  
  
Sometimes, Oishi reflects that he may have already had feelings for Kikumaru, then, he just did not understand what they were – or how (and more importantly  _why_ ) they were manifesting themselves.   
  
“Mm, Syuichirou, your parents are going to be up soon,” whined Kikumaru, brushing feather light kisses along Oishi’s jaw before meeting his lips again all-too briefly. Moments later, his face was buried in Oishi’s neck, pulling his older partner down to the bed and quickly returning the incorruptibility of the moment – or perhaps just wrangling the inclinations to the contrary.  
  
His breath was warm on Oishi’s shoulders and neck; it gently shifted the small hairs that had been shaved short along the topmost part of Oishi’s spine, and raised goose bumps on his arms and back. “Let’s go back to sleep, Oishi. There’s no morning practice – Mondays aren’t meant to be early days, anyway.” The childish sound to Kikumaru’s voice brought a thin smile to Oishi’s lips.  
  
He moved away from Kikumaru again, enough that the other boy would be able to sleep properly without his oaf of a partner smothering him. “Sweet dreams,” he whispered, kissing the very tip of his energetic partner’s nose.  
  
Sometimes, Oishi dreams of forever.  
  
 _There had been an utter disaster following Kikumaru’s impromptu declaration at his surprise party – which was far less of a surprise to him than the surprise he gave. While none of their teammates seemed to care – and almost all already knew about it, anyway (some of them even trying to plot the eventual romance between the Golden Pair) – the real problem was Kikumaru’s parents, siblings, and grandparents; the last of which made it very obvious that they did not approve, leaving the restaurant not long after Kikumaru had declared Oishi “his Syuichirou.”  
  
As far as Oishi could tell, Kikumaru’s siblings did not care one way or the other – they did not need him to carry on the family name (his eldest brother could take on that responsibility) and they all seemed pretty convinced that Oishi was plain, old-fashioned marriage material. An aspiring doctor – from a family of doctors – with dedication, manners, and intelligence… of course, they also promised plenty of torment; both of his sisters immediately demanding to know the details.  
  
Much like her children, Kikumaru’s mother was absolutely thrilled. She said that as long as it was Oishi, she was not worried about her son. That she knew that her little boy would be safe and loved as long as he was with Oishi. With an appraising look over Oishi, the head of the household said the same thing. Kikumaru’s father was probably the quietest in the whole house, but he still had the spark of silliness in him that infected all the rest. He told Oishi sternly that his son’s virtue was not to be compromised. Oishi decided then that he really hoped the subject of sex would not come up ever again – not in front of parents; whether the Kikumarus or his…  
  
…His own.  
  
The horrifying realization was what had landed him on the couch with his mother in the middle of the school day just before winter break; he had been feeling guilty ever since Kikumaru’s birthday party for keeping the secret from his parents, and it finally just all crashed down around him as he listened to his peers discussing their various plans for the new year. The Fujis apparently would all gather together at the house – even Yuuta; Fuji spoke of the occasion so fondly.  
  
Tezuka was spending the holiday with his entire extended family; Kawamura and his father had been invited to go to the Tezuka residence and had graciously accepted. Apparently, the Kaidous were taking a trip out of the country. Inui and his family were going to stay in and cook a feast. Momoshirou and his family were going up to the mountains. Echizen refused comment.  
  
It had been when Kikumaru had slipped his hand into Oishi’s half-way through the discussion that Oishi realized that Kikumaru was going to want to spend the holiday together – he, too, wanted to watch the sunrise with his partner… but if the Oishis and the Kikumarus got together, there was no doubt that someone would let slip to Oishi’s parents the truth about the relationship between the Golden Pair.  
  
Oishi wanted to be honest with his mother and father, anyway. So, he had left school then, in the middle of lunch break, and walked home despite the protests he received from Kikumaru.   
  
Tezuka offered to take notes for him.  
  
Stress had been high for the Seigaku seniors, anyway. With entrance exams looming in the not-nearly-far-enough distance, they had all found their different ways of preparing. Most days, Fuji and Tezuka could be found in the library with their heads bowed together over various books, preparing for the tests based on a book Kawamura had found that instructed the reader on how to study for entrance exams. Inui had created a new “menu,” this time for studying, that included a new, much more terrifying incarnation of Inui juice that resembled automobile oil and looked to bubble of its own volition.  
  
Kawamura had dropped out of practice entirely; he was giving up on tennis to help his dad at the store. But, really, Oishi knew that Kawamura used the free time that was normally taken by practice to poor over books at his desk – Oishi and Kikumaru had stopped by for dinner on a date one night only to find Kawamura just like that at the sushi bar.  
  
And, of course, Oishi being Oishi just studied. He had set out a certain amount of time to allocate to each subject every week, studying a different subject every night. He tried to get Kikumaru to study in the same way, but he really was not convinced that Kikumaru was taking his advice.  
  
He mentioned, off hand, one night the type of scores they would need to get into the school that had already offered them the tennis scholarship – and suddenly, from no where, Kikumaru burst into tears, resting his head in Oishi’s lap, sobbing heavily.   
  
“Oishi’s going to leave me,” he cried, “Oishi’s going to leave me because I’m too stupid!” The embarrassingly noisy and painful sounding sobs continued on despite Oishi’s gentle attempts at comfort – delicate touches and warm kisses. Eventually hysteria dissolved into hiccups, but by then, Oishi could tell, his partner was just numb.  
  
Sitting across from his mom, quietly, calmly explaining from start to finish what had happened was the most horrifying experience of Oishi’s life. His hands had clenched so tightly into fists that his knuckles had gone white and he was certain his fingernails had created a permanent set of angry indents in his palm. He just kept pleading wildly, in his mind, that she would not interrupt him – he would lost courage if he was interrupted.  
  
“You know how Eiji and I have always been close…” he started. After a few minutes of explaining, he ended with, “I told him I loved him.”  
  
He braced for the explosion, but it never came. Chancing a look at his mother’s eyes, he was met only with understanding in dark green a shade darker than his own. “You know… I think I knew.” Her voice shook the same way as Oishi’s abdomen seemed to tremble – he felt almost as though he had done a millions sit-ups, every muscle in his midsection completely exhausted from knotting itself nervously. “I think I knew because you look at him differently than anyone else, Syuichirou.”  
  
He nodded, bowing his head. “I understand if you don’t approve, but… I love him. I really…”  
  
“It’s okay, Syuichirou.” His mother came to sit beside him, laying an arm around his shoulders and pulling him tight against her side. “I’m so proud of you – I could not have asked for a better son. Falling in love doesn’t make me any less proud of you – even if it just so happens to be with a male friend. I will support you no matter what, because you’re my son.” She kissed his cheek, smoothed his hair, and presented him a very scary question. “Do you want me to talk to your father about it for you?”  
  
That was a no-brainer – it had been hard enough to do this, once. Oishi was certain he could not face his father with the same information. “If… if you would.”  
  
Once again his mother smoothed his hair, rocking him gently under her arm. “I will, Syuichirou. And, don’t worry – even if he doesn’t approve, he will still support you. And, if he even tries to say otherwise, I’ll make sure he understands.”  
  
“…Thank you, Kaa-san.”_   
  
Saturday had come – the Saturday that was two weeks after entrance exams.  
  
When Oishi got off school, the only thing he could think about was going home and checking the mail. Going home and looking for that letter from the school that would say that all of his hard work was for nothing and that he and Kikumaru would just have to go somewhere else. Or maybe he was just being pessimistic.  
  
With this in mind, he could not help but stare at Kikumaru incredulously when his partner suggested that they go over to Kikumaru’s house after school. It took a good amount of convincing (as well as a none-too-subtle command from Tezuka) before Oishi relented, walking home in silence with his partner, their school uniform sleeves swishing together as they walked too close to be friendly but not nearly as close as Oishi would have liked to walk… if they could have made their relationship public.  
  
It was not until the three stairs up to the porch that Oishi started to suspect his partner was up to something – the hand in his, the slight, excited grin that tugged at the edge of the red head’s mouth… it reminded Oishi a bit too much of the kind of face a boy made before he gave a girl a frog or put an ice cube down a friend’s shirt.  
  
Walking in the door, he understood why. The Oishis and the Kikumarus seemed to be all gathered together in Kikumaru’s living room, engaged in conversation. “We’re home!” The sudden sound from the doorway cued all four parents to look over at the two boys entering, toeing their shoes and leaving their school and tennis bags by the door.  
  
“Kaa-san, ‘Tous-san… why are you here?” Oishi went to the couch, leaning against the armrest by his father. No sooner had he sat down than he was nearly toppled over when Kikumaru threw himself at his partner, latching on to his back. Oishi let out a undignified “oof,” much to the amusement of the adults in the room.  
  
“Syuichirou,” his mother extended an envelope to him. “We got this in the mail today.”  
  
“There’s one for you, too, Eiji,” Said Kikumaru’s mother, extending a similar envelope to her son.  
  
…Their letters. Oishi glanced over his shoulder at Kikumaru, unsurprised that his partner had chosen to back off a couple paces, his eyes fixed on Oishi. “Let’s open them at the same time,” said Oishi.  
  
“No, I can’t. You first.” Kikuamru folded his arms over his chest, the envelope beneath them.  
  
Sliding his finger under the edge of the fold, trying to make the tear as neat as possible (and failing miserably), Oishi ripped open the envelope, pulling out a single piece of paper. That had to be a bad sign, right? A sign of rejection? Turning it over, he began to read, his eyes merely skimming.  _Oishi Syuichirou… doubles tennis… pleased to say…_  
  
“I – I’m  _in_!” The following few moments were a blur as there were cheers and congratulations from the others in the room and both of his parents were suddenly smothering him in tight embraces and kisses to the top of his head and cheeks. His heart skipped every other beat as he was not sure if he felt more relieved or even more stressed now. The thought made him laugh, a bursting, bubbly laugh that rid him of the rest of his anxiety.  
  
The moment was broken as he heard a second envelope ripping open. His eyes turned to Kikumaru, studying his partner carefully as the boy read his letter.  
  
“Well?” He moved away from his parents, going to stand in front of his partner, feeling his stomach clenching into the smallest size possible. If Kikumaru did not get in… could he… could he just leave Kikumaru behind? He promised they would go to high school together, but he needed this for his career. He was not prepared to give up his career for Kikumaru, and oh god Kikumaru had not said anything yet.  
  
The second set of parents looked as concerned as Oishi felt. Kikumaru’s mother whispered, “Eiji?” She made her son’s name a question – a question they did not want the answer to… none of them wanted to hear he had been rejected.  
  
Kikumaru’s head bowed, a tremble running through his shoulders as he made small, very distressing noises. His hand crumpling the letter. Oishi’s heart stopped. That meant… that meant that… “Eiji…” Oh god. Oh god, this was not how it was supposed to happen. This had to be a joke, this had to be…  
  
“Oishi,” whispered Kikumaru. “I got in.”  
  
\---  
  
Oishi kept the letter – it was pinned to the wall in his dorm room at college. His roommate once asked him in heavily accented English why Oishi kept that letter for so long – he could not read Japanese, so he did not understand the importance of what was written on the page.  
  
Or the fact that the addressee was Kikumaru Eiji.  
\---


	17. Chapter 17

\---  
 _Dear Tezuka,  
  
I’m writing you from Hawaii – we’re finally here! I don’t have internet access for long; I have to go down to an internet café to get online, but I wanted to at least say a few words to the team.   
  
I guess we won’t really be a team come fall though… I never thought much about it. You’ll miss having the Golden Pair to back you up – right? Nah, you’ll be fine.   
  
I’ll be back in August; so, why don’t you come meet me at the airport? I’ll bring you a present!   
  
Your vice captain, though not for much longer,  
  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Oishi -  
  
Enjoy your vacation; we can worry about the team later.  
  
Also, please kindly tell Kikumaru your contact information – he seems to believe you have given it to me but not him.  
  
-Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
Tezuka,  
  
I guess you’re right. Speaking of that, though… have you spoken to Momo yet? I mean, about the captain position?  
  
Eiji? He has my contact information…  
  
…I’ll email him.   
  
See you in three weeks!  
  
-Oishi  
  
\---  
  
I think we should speak with Momo together.  
  
Fuji thinks you should take pictures.  
  
-Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
Tezuka… is Fuji over at your house?  
  
\---  
  
Dear Taka-san,  
  
Hey! Just writing to tell you we’ve made it to Hawaii just fine! I hope all is going well at your restaurant with your dad. I really miss sushi since I’ve been here, though the local food is fantastic.  
  
I’ll bring you back a souvenir when I come home in August – what would you like?  
  
Yours,  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Hello, Oishi!  
  
I hope you had a nice flight over there. It’s been anything but lonely around the shop now that it’s summer and we have students coming in. Actually, we just hired a girl to help us at the shop… she’s really cute. I got to open up the shop with her this morning; we had a really nice conversation. She’s very smart… and pretty.  
  
Would it be too much trouble to bring back one of those dancing hula girls for the dashboard of a car? I think Dad wanted one.  
  
Have fun!  
Takashi  
  
\---  
  
Taka-san,  
  
Sounds like you really like the new girl. You’ll have to tell me if anything comes of it.  
  
I don’t think I’ve seen one, yet… seems like they should sell them here, but they don’t. Maybe in the airport. I have seen some real hula dancers – men and women both.  
  
Having a blast!  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Anything comes of it…?  
  
Oh – well, if you can’t that’s fine. Thank you for thinking of me.  
  
-Takashi  
  
\---  
  
Taka-san,  
  
You’re welcome! Good luck with the cute girl!  
  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Aloha, Fuji  
  
Hey, just writing you from Hawaii. But, as I understand it, you already knew I had made it safe and sound since you were over at Tezuka’s house, right?  
  
Have a wonderful vacation. Look after Eiji for me.  
  
Yours,  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Oishi,  
  
Yes, I have been over to Kuni-kun’s house this week a couple times. Kuni-ni-po has asked me to help him pack up some belongings from middle school to give to good will. He thought it would be a smaller project than it is – it’s taken us half a week, already.  
  
I’ll make sure your boy doesn’t get into too much trouble… unless I cause it, of course.  
  
Yours truly,  
Fuji  
  
\---  
  
Fuji,  
  
…Kuni-ni-po? Does Tezuka know you’re calling him things like this?  
  
And please don’t cause trouble with Eiji…   
  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Haven’t you ever wondered why I’m always running so many laps at practice? (It’s so very worth it, of course)  
  
:)  
  
Fuji  
  
\---  
  
With names like those, it’s no wonder you’re in the best shape of any of us.  
  
…A smile is so not an answer to a question, and you know it.  
  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
:)  
  
Fuji  
  
\---  
  
:(  
  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Aloha, Eiji!  
  
Didn’t I give you my contact information already? Well, it’s attached to this email in a word document – our international cell phone number, the number and name at the hotel… oh, I’m in room 308, by the way, if you need to call the room.  
  
I wish you were here. We went out to dinner on this little beachside restaurant last night – we were able to sit out in a patio section of the restaurant under the stars, and I was thinking it would have been so nice to have you here.  
  
Want me to bring anything back from Hawaii for you?  
  
Love you,  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Oishi! You’re mean! You left and you didn’t leave the contact information and there was no way for me to get in touch with you and you never told me that you would have internet access and… you’re mean.  
  
You’re such a girl, Oishi! But, you could have invited me…   
  
…Yeah, bring you back.  
  
Meeeeean.  
  
\---  
  
Eiji, I really thought I gave you a piece of paper with all the contact information before school was even out. But, you have it now, so why don’t you give me a call? If you get a calling card, it shouldn’t be too expensive. Alternately, I can try to reach you.   
  
I couldn’t have invited you – my family can really only afford to pay for the four of us.  
  
…I love you, Eiji.  
  
\---  
  
I can’t really be mad at you now. I love you, Osihi.   
  
Come back sooooooner.   
  
\---  
  
It’s only eight more days now, Eiji.  
  
Hugs and kisses,  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Oishi -  
  
I will come to meet you at the airport along with Kikumaru and Fuji. We will meet you and your family at the gate.   
  
-Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
Tezuka,  
  
All right, see you in six days!   
  
It’s been a great trip, it’s sad to leave.  
  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Twoooo daaaaaaaaays!  
  
Come hooooooooooooome.   
  
\---  
  
That isn’t too terribly long, Eiji, compared to the three weeks I’ve been here. It’s only a few hours before I get on my plane, now.  
  
Love,  
Oishi  
  
\---  
  
But I’ve miiiiiiiiiiiiiissed you. Don’t you miss me?  
  
\---  
  
Yeah, I miss you, too._  
  
\---  
  
The weariness of a traveler coming off of an international flight caused all other weary travelers’ woe to pale in comparison. Oishi stumbled down to warm arms, nearly being bowled over by the enthusiastic embrace before he really even had the chance to register what part of the airport he was in, or take in his surroundings.  
  
Through wisps of red hair he could see the smiling face of Seigaku’s genius singles player as well as Tezuka who was more intent to stare out over the concourse – looking around at the people milling about: waiting to leave, waiting for loved ones to come, rushing to flights, wearily wandering home…   
  
There was a kiss to the lobe of Oishi’s ear, pulling him back from his distraction to the boy in his arms. They were getting strange looks indeed – it was not only abnormal to see two people so openly embrace, it was even more curious for them to both be male.  
  
His mother, father and sister were close behind, but they opted to be received by Tezuka and Fuji; striking up a conversation which, thankfully, gave Oishi another moment longer alone with Kikumaru before they would have to let go at least long enough to walk to the car.  
  
“Stay the night tonight,” the redhead said lightly, his fingers tight on Oishi’s t-shirt. “I wanna be with you tonight.”  
  
Oishi just shook his head. “I’m exhausted, Eiji, and I need to unpack. We move into the dorm in a couple days, so you can be with me every night once we do… I think we both need to be with our families for now, since we’re going away to boarding school.” The older boy pulled away from his doubles partner, flashing an uncertain smile. “It’s only a couple more days. Then we have all school year.”  
  
He felt quite ill in the moment he and Kikumaru met eyes – the redhead’s eyebrows had drawn together, his eyes glossed over from unshed tears. “You don’t want to spend the night with me…? Didn’t you just spend the whole month with your family?”  
  
Compromise was in order. “Come over and stay the night with me, tonight, Eiji.” The suggestion did brighten his partner’s face. “I have some presents for you from Hawaii.” Those words reversed Kikumaru to his usual self; the redhead chanced a quick kiss to Oishi’s cheek before bounding over to greet his parents. The older boy turned his attention to Tezuka, making plans to go visit Momoshirou the next day.  
  
Oishi had brought home soveniers for all of his friends… but there was one really special one he bought for Kikumaru… that one would have to wait until they left for school before Oishi would give the gift to his partner. At least for the time being, Kikumaru was placated by the notion of getting gifts at all.  
  
\---  
  
 _Kuni-mogoro,  
  
I think Eiji isn’t happy with something about Oishi – maybe you should talk to him? He doesn’t think Oishi missed him at all while he was on his trip.  
  
See you at school tomorrow.  
  
-Syu-ko  
  
\---  
  
Fuji, where do you come up with these names? You will be running laps; at least double the usual amount.  
  
I think it’s not really our business. We did what we could. Oishi isn’t as stupid as you seem to believe. Kikumaru, perhaps.  
  
-Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
Kuni-ippo  
  
Why, from my vast intellect, of course! And, you aren’t captain anymore, starting tomorrow – you’re back to being a lowly freshman. Amazing to think that the great Kunimitsu shall be reduced to collecting balls for the starters!  
  
-Syu-chu  
  
\---  
  
We still aren’t on a first name basis, Fuji (and certainly not a nickname basis). And you will be running laps – no, suicides – until you die if you lead our new classmates to believe otherwise.  
  
\---  
  
Tezuka, you know my teasing is harmless? No need to get so serious.  
  
\---  
  
Is it, Fuji?  
  
\---  
  
Tezuka,  
  
Good luck at school tomorrow; we’re moving in to the dorms in the morning, so we don’t have to go to actual classes until Tuesday.  
  
Take care of everyone for me.  
  
Oishi  
\---  
  
Oishi -  
  
Good luck moving.   
  
_Tezuka paused, his fingers sitting over the keyboard for a long time; the pads of his finger tips lightly tapped the keys, not hard enough to produce a letter on the screen, but just hard enough to make a small clicking noise. _  
  
Take care of Kikumaru.  
  
-Tezuka_  
\---


	18. Chapter 18

\---  
The first few days of classes ate away any residual, lingering ill sentiments between Oishi and his partner over the older boy’s lack of desire to spend the last few days of vacation together. There had been a few small squabbles – where they would keep things in the dorm room, whether or not they needed two beds (Oishi quite firmly reminded his partner they would not be sleeping together every night; the younger boy thought they could use the extra space), whether or not two hour phone calls to Fuji were necessary… whether or not two minute phone calls to Tezuka were necessary…  
  
Oishi’s first inclination was to go out into the dorm and meet all their classmates, but as soon as they had settled, Kikumaru closed the door, locking it in his wake. “Eiji – don’t you want to meet the other guys in the dorm?” The older boy was straightening his comforter over his bed, not looking up at his partner, assuming that Eiji had locked the door only from the clicking sound from the threshold. There was no answer. “Eiji?” Oishi looked up just in time to catch a glimpse of his assailant before being pushed back into the bed.  
  
The redhead slithered up atop Oishi, holding the older boy’s arms above his head by the wrists with one thin hand. It was almost certain that Oishi could have easily gotten away from Kikumaru, but he hardly wanted to. The intoxicating way his partner flicked his tongue over Oishi’s lips made the older half of the Golden pair arch his back up, his lips reaching for his partner’s but falling short as the redhead pulled away from the desperate attempt to seal the kiss.  
  
Meeting Kikumaru’s eyes, he relented. “Okay, we can go meet our dorm mates in a minute.” That obviously had not been enough to convince his mischievous partner. He tried to arch upward again, his eyes half-lidded, his voice no more than a low rumble. “Kiss me.” He could feel the tremble that shivered down his partner’s arms, passing from smaller pale hands to Oishi’s own. He loved the power his voice held over his partner.  
  
“How ‘bout,” suggested the redhead, “we go meet everyone in fifteen minutes.” Oishi could not protest – there were quite suddenly soft lips to contest with his weak protests, and a roving hand already finding its way to his beltline.   
  
“Fifteen minutes,” parroted Oishi, allowing his hands to be pinned, even as he desperately wished to touch his partner – anywhere, everywhere. The tease. The older boy slowly raised one leg, bending at the knee, slowly rubbing over his partner’s groin – a small triumphant smirk gracing his lips as the redhead moaned into his mouth.   
  
They would have to learn to be quiet; dorm walls, they found out that day, were paper-thin.  
  
It was quite a shock to discover that Mizuki Hajime – data tennis player from St. Rudolph – was enrolled in half of his classes. It have never even occurred to Oishi that when they went to a small, boarding school that took in many transfers from St. Rudolph that they might even encounter some of the tennis players that had been their rivals in the past. He ran into the greasy boy in the common area in the evening after he had finished his dinner – Kikumaru had lagged behind to try to smuggle some desserts out of the dining hall.  
  
It would not have come as such a shock if Mizuki were not quite so… purple. He wore a light lavender poet’s shirt that hung away from his neckline, showing off a defined collarbone. The sleeves cinched at the wrists, leaving loose, poofing material to hang over delicate, feminine hands. The shirt was too long – it fell just above his knees, hanging about the dark denim of his blue jeans. He was licking the remainder of some sort of chocolate desert from his fingers when they, quite literally, collided headed in opposite directions to their dorm rooms.  
  
“…Mizuki-san, was it?” Oishi recognized the former St. Rudolph regular from junior high, but he could not remember if they had actually ever had a conversation. All he knew was that it would be best to be pleasant as he had been with all of the young men he had met so far in their dorm. They might just end up in tennis club together, after all, when the club activities began two weeks from then.  
  
The dark-haired boy stared at him for a long moment, unblinking, before straightening his shirt by the hem, only pulling more cloth away from his collarbone. “I heard word that the Golden Pair might be attending, but I am very pleased to confirm the rumors.” He coughed – a painful sounding cough. “But I had also heard rumors about your relationship, and according to Hiroshi-san in the room next to you…”  
  
The strange encounter was forgotten soon after, but Oishi made the sincere effort to keep Kikumaru quiet on the nights when he lost will to fight the inevitable and they chose to leave one bed made.  
  
Signing up for clubs had been a process – an unexpectedly arduous process for Oishi in particular. Immediately, he and Kikumaru had gone together to sign up for the tennis club; it was a term of their scholarship, but even if it had not been, the last intention on their minds was to give up on tennis or advancing the Golden Pair – besides, Oishi had promised Tezuka that he would beat Seishun Gakuen High in doubles one. To his slight bemusement, he once again encountered Mizuki, thankfully dressed in uniform as to not befuddle Oishi with his extensively violet wardrobe, also signing up for the club.   
  
“I look forward to playing with you,” offered their former rival, smiling nigh seductively to the older half of the famous doubles pair. Kikumaru muttered something about Mizuki being a nancing preener under his breath, but offered no words in return even when Oishi graciously returned the sentiment.  
  
The next table Oishi had gone to, under-surprised when his partner followed close at his heels, was the table for the student council. He spoke with the student body vice president from the previous year about how the election process worked for the student council officers and representatives worked as well as what sorts of hours of commitment it would require. He dealt with a grumbling Kikikumaru for days afterward – the redhead did not appreciate just how quick Oishi was to give up all of his day-time free periods; the times when he could see Kikumaru during the day since they were not placed in the same class division or any of the same electives.  
  
Oishi had made the argument that they still had their nights and Sundays together as well as tennis – things had not changed at all from junior high. The sentiment was quashed only days later when he started applying for jobs in the area around the school, looking for somewhere he could work late evenings and weekends just to make a little extra money – in truth, he was preparing for his partner’s upcoming birthday, but his partner only saw it as Oishi doubling back on his promise that they might have time together.  
  
Perhaps out of spite, the redhead made them visit one last club table – electing to sign up for tryouts for the select choir. Oishi knew that his partner had a very nice singing voice – and some vocal lessons – but he could not help but think that perhaps Kikumaru was just trying to get back at him for trying to take up the time Oishi elected to fill with student council.  
  
Part of their diploma from the school, though, did require an arts related elective – and Kikumaru was already signed up for the regular men’s chorus class. As Oishi understood it, it was one of the classes that would oftentimes do cooperative work with their sister school – an all girls boarding school less than three blocks away. His own arts elective – introductory performing theatre – was a class that combined students from both schools; and he was already signed up for tryouts for their first play – a modernized rendition of “Snow White.” It had already been decided that Mizuki – rather unfortunately in Oishi’s theatre group – would be the evil queen, even if he did not want the part.  
  
Mizuki, of course, jumped on the starring role.  
  
Quickly, they began to fall into routine – becoming comfortable with their surroundings and their new life. The phone calls to Fuji became shorter – and even when they ran long, Oishi stopped complaining about them. The phone calls to Tezuka became longer, but often because Kikumaru wanted to talk to their former captain as well. Their dorm mates no longer gave them strange looks or muttered insults under their breath about the obvious nature of their relationship. Occasionally, in the dining hall (during their rare time together in public) they would get a rather insulting gesture with the pinky, but for the most part anyone who was their friend or teammate had ceased to care; and Kikumaru insisted that no one else was worth their time. [1]  
  
Oishi was a little bit more concerned about public image, often swatting away his partner’s attempts at public displays of affection; but in private things were entirely different. He learned quickly that the public displays of affection, though, were important to Kikumaru – and he once again thought on the gift that he bought for his partner in Hawaii; that it might be time to present it to his partner.  
  
Oishi earned his varsity jersey in the doubles two spot almost immediately – Kikumaru followed less than two months after. It was then that he intended to pass the gift on to his partner – to celebrate the event.   
  
 _The only time Oishi remembered being truly terrified in his life was when he received the news three months into high school that his partner had been in a fight and had to be taken to the hospital. Oishi did not deal well with terror – he was normally the calmest person he knew under pressure, but even he stood frozen, staring at Mizuki in total disbelief as the news was delivered to him. Hospital. Kikumaru. Those two words were all that had filtered through for a long time before he had managed to collect himself enough to call Tezuka on his way out the door.  
  
Tezuka would know what to do – Tezuka always knew what to do.   
  
“Go stay with him – I’ll get in touch with Fuji and tell him what happened.” The low, smooth voice calmed Oishi’s nerves, even as his feet twitched with the desire to sprint to the bus stop. “Call in to work – and I’ll make sure someone contacts his family.” There was no more to the conversation – no words of consolation or reassurance. Oishi almost wished for a moment that his old friend would offer up something, but then it simply would not be Tezuka – the Tezuka he had turned to for strength.  
  
By the time he made it to the hospital, he was so geared up for the worst that he was infinitely relieved to discover that Kikumaru had needed no more than a steri-strip over his eyebrow; the laceration had been just small enough to avoid stitches. The bridge of his nose was covered in a thin, white bandage – a throwback to another time – that covered a small fracture in the cartilage, the doctor had explained. The redhead’s lower lip was fat and split on the right side – blood had turned into a dark, almost purple rounded scab.   
  
Already, an angry blue-gray mark was forming over his left cheek, splotchy against his otherwise even-toned pale cheek. Despite, Kikumaru’s face brightened; color that had drained away returning as he spotted Oishi; the redhead whimpered as he kissed his partner’s cheek despite the older boy’s small, failed attempt to warn him otherwise. He tried to ask what happen, but his partner seemed much more content to sneak painful kisses to his face, wherever he could reach – whispering like a near-silent skipping disc that he loved Oishi; he loved Oishi. He loved Oishi.  
  
That was when the older boy spotted one of their upperclassmen sitting a couple beds down in the emergency room, holding an ice pack to his face, his arm set in a splint. He was not looking at them – but Oishi recognized the boy as the one who had fought their coaches’ decision to make two freshman their starters in doubles two – Golden Pair or not. At the time that Oishi received his jersey, before Kikumaru had even been considered for a starting position, he had received threats of violence from that very upperclassman.  
  
Pieces fell together very quickly in his mind. When the very last piece clicked into place, he was moving away from the redhead without even realizing it – fear and concern warping abruptly into blind rage. Kikumaru was his – was his responsibility – was hurt because of him. Kikumaru was hurt. This guy hurt Kikumaru. This guy hurt his Kikumaru.  
  
He threw the punch before the already injured boy could react; though the upperclassman was shrieking for a nurse as he was toppled from his perch on the bed to the cold tiled floor from the sheer force of the punch. Oishi’s hand ached – he was in no way trained to fight, he just seemed to have the instinct to hit as hard as he could muster when push came to shove.  
  
It was not until he registered Kikumaru hanging from his arm that he came back from his sudden thirst for blood – the redhead looked concerned. “Oishi – he’s not worth it. It’s okay. It’s not worth it.”  
  
“It’s not okay!” He snapped the words back at his partner, jerking his arm away. “You’re hurt, and that’s not okay!” There were tears in his eyes. A young male nurse was rushing into the room, going to help the upperclassman back into the bed. “It’s not okay,” Oishi said again, this time so quietly that only his partner could hear him. The male nurse was commenting that he should wait outside.  
  
Neither member of the Golden Pair heeded the words of the nurse; Kikumaru moved closer, wrapping himself around his partner. “He wasn’t wrong, though. I’m just some gay freshman too in love with my partner to be any good at tennis on my own. I don’t deserve the spot on the team.” The redhead also began to cry. “That’s all we are, isn’t it? Faggots who can’t even be apart on the court. That’s all we’re worth.”   
  
“No – Eiji, no.” The Golden Pair worth nothing but love? Was love so devalued? Was their unbreakable partnership so devalued? Was their partnership so… breakable? “No, Eiji. It’s not like that.”_   
  
Yes, Eiji – we are that fragile.   
  
 _Oishi clung to his partner for all he was worth._  
  
A week after the incident, Oishi asked his partner to come out to lunch with him on a Sunday – they left campus and walked down to wharf, finding a small sushi shop not far off the water. It was no Kawamura sushi, but the food was good enough, and the company was more than enough to make up for the food.   
  
Already, the bruise on Kikumaru’s face had faded from blue to a puss-y yellow-green to his natural skin tone, though it was still sore to the touch. The laceration on his lip had mostly healed – it was not visible to the casual passer-by – but it was still a bit swollen; the redhead still made small noises of clear pain when they kissed.  
  
There had been so many other bruises – on Kikumaru’s chest and arms; none had been visible below Kikumaru’s uniform. The redhead had done a masterful job of hiding the bruises from his partner; wearing long-sleeved shirts to bed and changing when Oishi was in the bathroom. It had only worked for a few days until Oishi suspected there was something going on – it only doubled his concern that Kikumaru would hide such a thing from him… but then again, maybe that was why the redhead had been hiding his bruises in the first place.  
  
The subtle weight in the pocket of his windbreaker very briefly caught his attention as he leaned across the table to pluck a piece of sushi from the plate between them with his chopsticks. He set it on the plate in front of them, staring at it for a long time, contemplating each visible piece of rice in turn before coming to the absolute conclusion that he needed to address the problem that had been echoing between his ears; keeping him awake long into the night, even with the comfort of a second body in the bed beside him.  
  
“Hey, Eiji… I have another gift for you from Hawaii.” He set his chopsticks down, unmindful of the sudden light in Kikumaru’s eyes – the way his partner scooted imperceptibly closer to the table, as though being closer would make the gift come to his hands sooner. “I didn’t give this to you sooner because I wasn’t really sure if it was a good idea…” Even as things stood, he almost felt as though he should ask permission as his hand clenched around the small paper bag in his pocket. “But… I really want you to have this.”  
  
He handed the bag to Kikumaru. Immediately, the redhead turned the bag over, dropping the contents within into his hand with a small metallic clank. The slightly larger ring settled nicely atop the smaller; both rounded yellow gold. Silence swallowed Kikumaru; Oishi wondered if even his heart had been hushed from the sudden pale of his cheeks.  
  
The older boy plucked the larger ring from his partner’s hand, sliding it over his own right middle finger. “I – I know that it upsets you that I don’t like public displays of affection, so I thought this would be okay. This way, I can always be holding your hand… see?” He displayed his own ring, fiddling with the band with the forefinger of his left hand.  
  
The redhead continued to be noiseless for several stretching seconds. “Oishi…”   
  
\---  
  
He never removed the ring from his finger. His first and only girlfriend in Italy asked its significance while they were dining in a small restaurant on the coast. “My doubles partner in tennis wears the matching ring,” he had explained cheerfully.  
  
When there was a natural break in conversation, Oishi excused himself to the restroom, proceeding to be violently ill.  
  
The tears subsided within a couple minutes… but he never even touched his meal.  
\---

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] The Japanese myth of a man and woman destined to marry being joined by a red thread on their pinky finger, when referenced between two men, suggests they are gay. Therefore, holding up a pinky finger in reference to two men is typically an insult.


	19. Chapter 19

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He had sacrificed almost every weeknight and at least part of most Sundays in order to earn the money for the tickets, but he had finally procured them. It had cost a pretty penny – as well as several phone calls from his uncle who had a few connections in the business – to secure not only front-row tickets for the show but also back-stage passes to meet the band. Of course, this would not be their first time to meet the band, but it was the best birthday present he could think of for his partner – the redhead had been talking about it for months.  
  
Winter break was just around the corner – Kikumaru’s birthday had already passed with Oishi promising that the gift would come a bit late, but it would be worth the wait. In the meantime, Oishi had found other ways of making his partner’s birthday very memorable. It had fallen on a Sunday, allowing them to go out together – just the two of them – and enjoy the day. It had ended with dinner over at the Kikumaru residence (a memory that would likely stick with Oishi into old age, like most of his experiences with the Kikumaru family) and a quiet walk over to Oishi’s house where they spent the night – Oishi’s parents offered them a ride back to school in the morning.  
  
It was not even two weeks later that the tickets came in the mail – the concert was set for New Year’s Day – some local radio station had set up a concert of several different bands – it was an all-day event with mostly general admission seating; but the title band, the band that they had front-row seats to see, was the Chocolates.  
  
Tennis practice for the day was rained out – Oishi and Mizuki both stayed behind a few extra minutes in drama club to speak with the rest of the cast of their upcoming play. It was set to be preformed not long after the New Year during the school festival – Oishi had somehow landed himself the role of Prince Charming, though he could not comprehend the decision himself. The attractive second year girl who had been cast as Snow White had explained that it was because he was the most prince-like of the boys in the class – Mizuki, naturally, protested loudly despite how much he enjoyed his own role of the evil queen.  
  
She called him over as the others were filing out of the room. “Oishi-kun,” she pressed her fingers into his shoulder, the touch surprising him. “We should spend some time together – you know, so we’ll be more comfortable on stage.” She tossed him a playful wink – bringing his mind abruptly to just what he needed to be comfortable with, and his cheeks reddened. Of course, the wink only made him think of Kikumaru – then Kikumaru in a dress – then kissing Kikumaru in front of an audience while wearing tights…  
  
Cheeks and ears burning, Oishi excused himself, muttering something about how he would like that and darting out the door to catch up with Mizuki. He fell into step with his classmate, sharing a meaningful glance before they both burst into snickers. “You’re popular with the older women, I see,” commented Mizuki, slinging his bag over his shoulder, holding one elbow at an awkward angle as they walked down the hall toward the exit. “Does Kikumaru know about this?” His free arm shot out to elbow Oishi in the ribs.  
  
The older boy squawked indignantly, walking just a half step in front of his classmate as they made their way to the mailboxes. “What is there to know?” No sooner had he spoken the words than he was nearly bowled into Mizuki by a body being hurled into his opposite side. He staggered, catching himself just in time to be kissed playfully on the tip of the nose. “E—Eiji!”   
  
With a devious giggle, the redhead folded his hands behind Oishi’s head, coming to stand in front of the older boy with a coy smile quirking at his lips. “Yeah – what is there to know, Syuichirou?” Each syllable of the name was spoken separately, dragging the moment out agonizingly while Mizuki stood still to their side and some of Oishi’s classmates filed past them.  
  
Gently, with two hands to Kikumaru’s chest, Oishi pushed his partner away. “One of my upper classmen in our drama class wants to get together outside of class so we can practice together.” The disappointment was clear in the younger redhead’s eyes. Even after Oishi’s attempt with the rings to dispel his partner’s need for public displays of affection, it was still very clear that his partner was not happy about it. It was not so much that Kikumaru wanted to show off what he had – it was more that when he wanted attention, he expected immediate gratification. It came with being the youngest child.  
  
The redhead made a face that would scare the scarecrows away. “Sounds like she is asking you out, Oishi.” The tone of his voice, much like his twisted countenance, clearly suggested complete disapproval. His took Oishi’s hand, giving the older boy a meaningful look. “You said ‘no’ to her, right?”  
  
Ever helpful, Mizuki interjected into the conversation, “Oishi-kun was quite the gentleman about it.” He had quickly shirked Kikumaru’s question, saving the former Seigaku vice captain quite a bit of embarrassment. The dark-haired boy glanced between the Golden Pair, finally just giving a small shake of his head. “I’m going ahead, Oishi-kun; Kikumaru-san.” He did as he said he would, ambling away into the rain, using a textbook to protect his hair from the downpour, heaven forbid it should get wet.  
  
The redhead was still frowning, watching Mizuki prancing off in the rain like a fairy. “He’s so annoying,” strange words to hear from Kikumaru, even when whined in the same tone he sometimes used when speaking about his older siblings. “Oishi,” again, every syllable was like its own word, “how do you put up with him?” His eyes turned away, Kikumaru looked almost serious; his profile was sharper, more adult than looking at his face from the front… for a moment, he looked almost grown-up. Though, that effect was, of course, totally ruined by the whining.  
  
Oishi slid an inconspicuous arm around his partner, leading the other boy out into the rain. “Well, I put up with you, don’t I?” The question warranted him more whining and a not-playful-enough punch in the shoulder, but Oishi just laughed, ignoring the rain and the curious looks from their schoolmates. “How was your day?” It was sort of strange to be saying something so domestic – so normal – but he found that he and Kikumaru had to talk about their days every evening; like a family gathering around the table for dinner exchanging small talk. He honestly cared – was honestly curious.  
  
Unconditional love was like that – needing to have someone with him every day; being so accustomed to a face that the thought of going a day without Kikumaru confused him, created a heavy lump that sat uncomfortably above his Adam’s apple, choking him.   
  
The mailboxes were under an overhang outside his dorm – his in particular, number 1724, was on the far end of the third row of boxes; Kikumraru’s was in the first row on the left side near the bottom. The redhead went to check his own mail while Oishi opened the small silver box with his name printed on the outside, pulling out the single envelope within – a window envelope with an unfamiliar address on the outside. Through the plastic window, however, he could see his name and address printed onto an event ticket. A grin broke out on his face as he turned to his partner.  
  
Kikumaru was turning over a letter in his hands – he had that look on his face as though it was from his mother, his eyebrows drawn together, his lips pursing just slightly. The lady of the house had taken it upon herself to send mail to her son at least once a week since they had moved into the dorms… she did not want for her son to get too lonely.  
  
“Eiji,” the redhead looked up at the sound of his name. “Your birthday present finally came.” Oishi waved the envelope, drawing his partner’s attention to the piece of mail. A bright smile immediately broke out on Kikumaru’s face – there was nothing he loved more than surprises. Just like a little kid at Christmas, the younger half of the Golden Pair always became excited at the thought of getting a surprise – especially a good surprise and, Oishi had learned, especially a good surprise from Oishi.  
  
The envelope was passed between their hands – Kikumaru did not so much as pause to look at the front of the envelope before tearing it open, pulling out the slips of paper within – they were thick, printed on something between tag board and regular paper, and the edges were perforated as though they had been torn from a larger sheet of tickets. The lettering had been burned onto the paper – tickets were not printed with ink, but on a special sort of paper that responded to heat appropriately to the paper, setting the letters into the paper. Oishi suspected it had to do something with fraud.  
  
Silence drifted between them; the envelope slipped out of Kikumaru’s right hand, his left trembling; the tickets fluttered like the wings of a small bird. “I – I don’t…” His voice was small, barely carrying over the soft pattering noise of the rain falling on concrete beyond. “You… you got me…” Oishi could hear his partner’s voice hitching on the words… he knew what came next. He braced himself for it long before it came.  
  
“Oishi!” Despite the fact he was prepared, Oishi was still nearly bowled into the mailboxes when his partner took a flying leap at him, settling against his chest. “Oishi, you got tickets to the Chocolates! Front row!” He looked up at his partner, his eyes filled with tears. Oishi had never really considered until that moment that he had, in fact, grown significantly taller than his partner in the past year when they had been not long before within a few centimeters in height. “Syuichirou.” The younger boy went on tiptoe, brushing his lips over the very tip of Oishi’s nose. “Thank you.”  
  
A bit awkwardly, Oishi let his arms settle back around his partner, smiling. “You’re welcome.” He added, “I love you.” It was almost strange to speak the words – words that by no means needed to be said. It would have been just as strange, though, to not say them… he was thinking them just then. He loved the way Kikumaru lit up for him; the way red hair, deep ruby from the rain, fell over blue eyes but went unnoticed and untended. “So much,” Oishi added further, touching their foreheads together by craning his neck downward like a swan.  
  
“Love you more,” teased Kikumaru, his voice light and wistful. He settled his head under Oishi’s, curls tickling Oishi’s collarbone. He was doing a wonderful job of making Oishi feel guilty for having to push his partner away to feel comfortable – they could do this later in their room. His heart clenched just a bit when Kikumaru gave him that look – that “what did I do” look – before going back to examining the tickets. “New Years day…”  
  
“Yeah, do you have plans?” Oishi started to close his mailbox, turning from his partner.  
  
“There’s another one,” Kikumaru pointed out, pulling out an envelope from the mailbox, examining it. “Wow… it’s from Italy.” He blinked at his partner, passing the envelope over. “Do you have a pen pal in Italy, Oishi?” There was an edge to his voice now – almost a jealous edge. It was the same strange edge that he sometimes used when Oishi would talk on the phone with Tezuka or would bring up Mizuki when they were talking about their classes.  
  
The older boy frowned at the envelope – the blue airmail sticker instantly drew attention to the front of it. It was addressed to him, something written in Italian by the postmaster on the bottom. It had been mailed almost a week before he was in receipt. Sliding a finger under the back of the envelope, he tore it open – unfolding the single sheet of paper, surprised to find it was in English.  
  
“New Years day…” Kikumaru was still mumbling to himself.  
  
 _Syuichirou Oishi_ , his name was written the western way.  _We have recently received recommendation letters from your teachers and coaches for our program – we are looking for young athletes who are pursuing careers in the sports medicine field for a selective…_  
  
A startling shout tore Oishi’s attention away from the letter. “I know, Fuji!” There was a bright grin on Kikumaru’s face as he latched himself to Oishi’s arm, dragging Oishi to the side. “I’ll take Fuji with me. He doesn’t like the Chocolates, but he owes it to me to suffer through it after he made me sit through, like, a million hours of kabuki…”   
  
Automatically, Oishi opened his mouth to correct his partner on the length of a kabuki show, but then it processed for him just what Kikumaru was saying. After all the hours that Oishi had worked to pay for the tickets – after getting a thoughtful (and expensive) gift for his lover of over a year and partner for over four, Kikumaru was just going to take Fuji? And as retribution?   
  
Something snapped. Oishi could not be certain if he was hurt or angry, but something in his chest burned as though a match had been lit below his lungs. It hurt a lot – it made his stomach twist and his eyes sting; his cheeks flushed with something that was not embarrassment. That was – Kikumaru was…   
  
 _Fuji?_  
  
“Heh,” the redhead settled his head against Oishi’s shoulder. “So… what’s the letter say?” He peered over Oishi’s arms, trying to read what was written on the page. “It’s in English? That’s terrible. Man, I’m awful at English. Will you read it to me, Oishi?” Blue eyes turned up to look at Oishi, and suddenly Kikumaru went quiet, excitement draining out of him like the color leaving someone unfortunate enough to see a ghost. “…Syuichirou, what’s…?”  
  
The older boy gently disengaged from his partner, folding the letter. “It’s nothing important, Eiji. Let’s go back to the dorm room to get changed, okay?” He was amazed at how level his voice sounded. Amazed still that the paper of the letter had not torn in two under the vice grip of his blanched knuckles and strained fingers.  
  
Kikumaru regarded him carefully for a moment. “Sure, I’ll give Fuji a call, too. See if he can go.”   
  
A small tear ripped through the top of the letter, unnoticed to both of them, but silently they walked together back to the dorm room.  
  
 _It was not even a week later that Kikumaru had forgotten the incident entirely… Oishi could not stop replaying it in his mind. He would often distract himself by reading over the letter he had received from the school in Italy again – picking it apart as though to make sure that his English was not failing him and he had understood properly what it was saying. He was being invited into a program that would start his senior year in high school and would run through university, if he chose to stick with it – it would be both an opportunity to play tennis and a chance to study medicine at a prestigious school.  
  
Hands on experience with professional athletes, promised the letter. He would be receiving a packet of information within the week. If he was interested in the program, he was to contact their office of admissions and request an application… then he would set up a telephone interview, and be asked to come out to Italy to do a second in-person interview and take a tour of the campus.  
  
During his lunch hour every day, Oishi had been leaving student council meetings just a little bit early so he could check his mail… he was growing impatient to get more information on the program so he could talk to his parents about it… and eventually Kikumaru. The day it came, a Thursday, Oishi left the campus without thinking twice about his afternoon classes or his partner who would be left waiting for him after his drama class (and forced to walk to the dorms with Mizuki, in all likelihood) and got on the first bus he could catch to Seishun Gakuen Senior High.  
  
He still did not entirely understand why he went there first. He went to the tennis courts, arriving just in time to see captain Yamato unlocking the clubhouse, dressed in his school uniform. Even in a school uniform, he wore the jacket off his shoulders and looked entirely too old to just be a senior in high school. The older boy spotted Oishi and grinned ear to ear. “Ah, my other favorite freshman finally appears.” When he turned to Oishi, the jacket over his shoulders shifted magically without actually slipping from his shoulders. How did he do that? “I thought for sure I’d be blessed with you and Tezuka-kun on my team again this year.”  
  
Oishi laughed nervously. “You do have Tezuka on your team, Yamato-sempai.” He smiled – a hard thing to avoid in the presence of Yamato. “Not to mention Fuji and Inui. You only lost half of us.” Kawamura no longer played tennis and had moved schools to a larger high school that was nearer his dad’s store. And the other, of course, was Kikumaru who now played with Oishi at their high school.   
  
For an odd moment, Yamato looked almost serious. “This team is really going to miss you next year. Tezuka is only half the package.” A grin broke out across his face again, as though he had never been serious to begin with. “You came to see him, right? Must be missing some classes to be here so early.” As he spoke, Yamato went into the clubhouse – Oishi followed, looking around the clubhouse curiously. It was basically the same as the one over at the junior high school, just a little bigger. It smelled the same, too. Wrinkling his nose just a bit, Oishi went to the bench and sat down, unmindful of his former captain changing into his tennis gear somewhere to his left.   
  
“Yeah, I came to see Tezuka. Can you excuse him from practice today? This is important.” Oishi hunched forward, his hands resting over his lap. “I normally wouldn’t ask – I don’t want to cause trouble, but…”  
  
A hand fell on his shoulder, startling him. Oishi looked up to see his other former captain – his closest friend – standing behind him. Looking stern; though it was Yamato who had rested the hand on his shoulder. “This isn’t the army, Oishi-kun. That’s fine.” The older boy had still yet to remove his sunglasses, though he had fully changed into his regular jersey and warm-up pants, the magically non-shifting jersey jacket settled in its usual position. “He’ll probably make me run twenty laps for saying that to you, though.”  
  
Oishi could not help but grin at his former captain. “Tezuka gives you a hard time, then?” They both laughed – the other boy in the room made an “hmpf” noise in the back of his throat, shouldering his tennis bag again.   
  
“I’m not practicing today, then?” He posed the question rhetorically, and it was not answered. Yamato left the room before Tezuka even finished speaking, leaving the former captain and vice captain pair alone in the clubhouse.   
  
Tezuka removed his glasses, cleaning them on his shirt before putting them back on. Quietly, Oishi chastised, “You shouldn’t do that – you’ll scratch the lenses.” He received quite a look from the former captain – a look that was almost bemused… but perhaps it was just unsurprised. “I’m worrying too much again, aren’t I?” The older boy smiled sadly.  
  
“Yes,” replied Tezuka, his usual monosyllabic self. He inspected his glasses for a moment before replacing them on his face. “Where’s Kikumaru?” When Oishi did not answer right away, Tezuka seemed to understand. He headed toward the door, opening it. “We’re going to go for a walk, right?”  
  
“Yeah – that would be nice.”_  
  
Kikumaru had a way of looking irresistible when he wanted to – that particular night, dressed for the concert, it was a pair of jeans that laced up the side and left very little to the imagination… not that Oishi needed much of an imagination to picture those legs; the same legs he had been staring at for years. Over the pants was a shirt that Oishi was positive was originally his – collared and only mostly buttoned, showing off Kikumaru’s belly button and collarbone.   
  
It was nights like those – irresistible nights – the Oishi would find himself hard-pressed to move away when his partner would curl around him, touching their lips together too frivolously to be kisses but too sturdily to ignore. Nights like those his hands would wander wherever they could touch; his eyes would fall shut against the light shining in through their window from a streetlamp. Nights like those, all was forgiven.   
  
He no longer remembered when it happened – when they shifted from being constantly idiotic and bumbling to melding together as though made of the same flesh – it no longer was of much consequence. The need for words had been whispered away by intuitive touches and the frustrating moments when they could not get closer – the long glances over the dinner table and shared breaths during tennis practice. The lines of communication crumbling between them drifted away unnoticed as new bonds were formed – physical and spiritual bonds that left the intellect far behind.  
  
But the moment was only brief as they spoke whispered farewells into one another’s lips – the redhead leaving the Oishi household to meet up with Fuji for the concert; Oishi staying behind to wait for Tezuka and his family to come over.   
  
 _“Have you told Kikumaru about this yet?” Tezuka paused a moment, catching Oishi mid-step. It only occurred to Oishi then, watching the puffs of barely visible breath coming from their mouths in the departing sun, that this was the same place he and Tezuka made their original promise. Many years ago, they had stood here as two small boys – boys of small stature but not smaller heart – and had promised to go together to the top. Now, standing in their own tracks, Oishi admired his friend even more than he did at the time of the promise._  
  
He shook his head no – Kikumaru and Oishi’s parents were still in the dark about this school in Italy…Oishi would tell them eventually, but Tezuka had become his first priority once again. Maybe it was because he was still upset over his partner’s decision to take Fuji to the concert with him – to never even think of Oishi. Or maybe it was because, in some very small part of Oishi, he still considered this dream of becoming a doctor something he shared with Tezuka. It may have been his own dream… but it was because of Tezuka that…  
  
They did not speak of it again, that day. Tezuka neither voiced his support nor spoke against it… he just walked beside Oishi, saying nothing unless spoken to. That was all he had to do, though, for Oishi to feel confident in making the decision. He would apply.  
  
Kikumaru never even once crossed Oishi’s mind as he enjoyed soaking in the hot springs on New Years day. His family had gone with the Tezuka family to a natural spring up in the mountains – it had been a long drive, but more than worth it when Oishi could finally feel the water soaking away the knots in his muscles, relaxing him fully despite the pungent reek of boiling eggs from the sulfur.   
  
The offer – the invitation – had come when Oishi mentioned that Kikumaru would not be taking him to the concert. Tezuka suggested lightly that perhaps it would be good for Oishi to take the time away from his partner, saying that a weekend retreat to the hot springs could only do his good friend good. Kikumaru would have plenty of time to be with Oishi when the winter vacation was over. Oishi was hardly surprised that, once again, Tezuka had been absolutely right about him needing a vacation… and he was enjoying himself immensely.   
  
On the ride up to the springs, he had worked up the courage to show his parents the information on the school in Italy, telling them that he had already begun to fill out the application for admission. His parents had been at first concerned, but as always very supportive; both were impressed that their son was working toward such a high goal. Oishi wondered if he could have managed it without Tezuka sitting beside him. The other boy had been staring absently out the window at the time, but Oishi saw in the reflection in the glass that his friend was watching them from the very same reflection.  
  
Oishi smiled at his former captain; Tezuka quickly looked away, back out at the scenery when he realized he had been caught in the act.   
  
Would he miss this more or less by going off to Italy? Oishi knew he would not have craved some time with his stoic friend quite so badly had it not been from the constant exposure to Kikumaru… he wondered if perhaps that was the only reason he even got along with Kikumaru in middle school for the first two years… because he still had Tezuka to keep him sane; and Kikumaru had Fuji to keep him distracted.  
  
Some part of Oishi thought that maybe this was how things were really supposed to be – he should not be so hurt that Kikumaru did not take him to the concert; Kikumaru should having been spending time with his friend aside from Oishi, and Oishi should have been doing the same. They had, maybe, gone in just a little too fast, forgetting that while their partnership meant the world to them, there was still the world to consider – the world of equal value to their partnership – both the literal and the romantic.  
  
Oishi changed seats – they were in a charter bus with plush seats and plenty of them – no one had to share a seat. Still, he scooted in beside Tezuka and joined him in looking out the window, the happy smile still on his face. The bespectacled boy gave him a look out of the corner of his eye, but moved back slightly so that Oishi could see out the window a little better.  
  
The last of the tension dissolved in warm water and a deep voice speaking in low tones about the various antics of Oishi’s former classmates. For the first night in weeks, Oishi was able to sleep peacefully on a futon, rolled out next to Tezuka’s, a serene smile on his lips throughout a dreamless sleep.  
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	20. Chapter 20

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Like all young boys in the Seigaku tennis club, Oishi developed a bit of a hero complex in regards to their captain; the mysterious Yamato Yuudai who hardly ever was actually seen playing tennis so much as spouting words of much apparent wisdom. He was an enigma, and in the shining eyes of lock-kneed first years, he was some sort of god.  
  
Oishi rested his arms, crossed, over Kawamura’s back with a heavy sigh. The boy tried his best to reach his sneaker-clad toes, bending only about halfway before making noises of mild distress. To Oishi’s right, somewhere, Tezuka was wowing everyone by making a pancake of himself as he stretched, leaving Fuji to look a bit bored as his spotter.  
  
“Inui!” The whine drew Oishi’s attention instead to his left where Kikumaru was practically tied in a pretzel while Inui jotted notes in a small green notebook. “Hey – you’re supposed to help me stretch. Inui, you slacker.” The redhead caught Oishi’s eyes on him. “He’s a slacker, right, Oishi?” The boy had no concept of proper enunciation.  
  
“You don’t look like you need help, Kikumaru,” replied the dark-haired boy, warranting a glare from his newly found doubles partner. “Ah – sorry, I mean Eiji.”  
  
The redhead tried a second source of support. “Fuji? Don’t you think Inui should be helping me?” The boy he was addressing was beginning to sit down, switching positions with Tezuka who leaned lightly on his shoulders.   
  
Fuji suggested, “I think maybe you should help Inui with his stretching instead, Eiji.” As always, the tennis prodigy wore a warm smile.  
  
It was hard to focus as the season was drawing to a close; the temperatures were peaking in August and the sun was beginning to set earlier and earlier by the day. The regulars were only involved in practice with the first years long enough for the freshman to gather stray tennis balls, and even the god-like Yamato disappeared for long periods of time to one of the tennis courts – somewhere isolated from the first years, unfortunately.   
  
The school year was really only starting to move into full swing, they were going to classes for the first time as freshmen; they were making new friends through means other than clubs; Oishi himself was able to spend more time with Tezuka while his newly found doubles partner was able to spend time with his friend Fuji. They rarely saw their upperclassmen teammates outside of clubs period, though the captain made a conscious effort to come and visit Oishi and Tezuka in particular during the school day. He said that the two of them would one day carry the weight of Seigaku on their shoulders.  
  
The words he used those days would one day later echo from Tezuka to Echizen – the charismatic brunette was to become the pillar of support for Seigaku. The words that he had missed, however, the words that had been spoken from Yamato to his prodigal doubles player, and intended for Oishi’s ears alone that there was no one better suited to holding Seigaku together than the shy young boy – Tezuka may have been elected to be the pillar of support upon which all of them would lean and rely, but Oishi was the one that would keep them all together as a team and as a family… because he could handle the stoic up-and-coming captain, and he could handle his own over-enthusiastic partner.  
  
When it had come the time to choosing a captain after Tezuka was taken from the lineup, it was not a surprise that Echizen was taken into consideration – the surprisingly young tennis star had contracted the attention of not only other students in the club or in the school, but also rival schools, periodicals, and even some high schools and universities had begun to pay a bit more attention to the rising star’s career. But it was not Echizen who would be awarded that position – Echizen who had been instructed to assume the position as the pillar of Seigaku from his captain was missing the element that Yamato had spoken to Oishi about in a private side conversation one day on the way from class to lunch.  
  
After being captain for a year, Momoshirou had sobered somewhat – not in his personality that would always be outspoken and a bit brash, but his sense of responsibility and duty had sharpened; he thought more of his team and of his players than of his own game and goals – he was in constant contact with Oishi throughout the year, sometimes to ask for advice, sometimes just to shoot the shit. It was one email in particular, though, that had brought a smile to Oishi’s face – he forwarded it to Tezuka.  
  
\---  
  
 _Oishi-sempai,  
  
I now fully appreciate and understand what it was you went through keeping a team together single-handedly. Buchou didn’t make it any easier on you, did he?  
  
Seigaku is having an event next season where they’re going to invite back former regular members to do a practice with the team. I’d really like it if you and Eiji-sempai could come. How is he? I haven’t really heard from him, aside from what Fuji told me about the concert.  
  
Take care,  
Momo-buchou (That’s what they call me these days)  
  
\---  
  
Momo –_  
  
Oishi paused in writing the email for a long time – Kikumaru leaned into his shoulder, demanding why it was the older boy looked like he might cry. The acrobatic player worked to get a peek of the email over his partner’s shoulder, but Oishi would not let him read what was written on the screen, deferring him with a playful kiss on the corner of the mouth and a few whispered words to have patience.  
  
 _That really means a lot to me, Momo. It might not seem like much, but that… really touched me. Actually, Tezuka wasn’t such a terror. Well, not as a captain, anyway. He’s hell to have as a friend.  
  
Keep me updated with that event next season – I’d love to participate. Any idea who will be captain of the team next year? Echizen, perhaps?  
  
Eiji’s doing just fine, I think. He’s really getting into his electives, lately, especially with finals coming up for us. I think he’s worried he won’t perform very well on his exams, but he refuses to study with me on the schedule I’ve planned. He’s also very nosey, and shouldn’t be yelling at me for talking behind his back; can’t be behind your back if you’re reading this, now can it, Eiji?_  
  
When the redhead returned to his own desk, grumbling the whole while about how mean Oishi was, Oishi removed the last two sentences.  
  
 _Actually, there’s something very wrong with Eiji. He isn’t acting himself, lately, or perhaps he is acting himself, I just never really noticed that this was him. I fell in love with this person – or perhaps with the idea of this person – and now I don’t know how to separate Eiji, my partner, from Eiji, my lover. I’m not falling out of love – it’s nothing like that – I just don’t know how – where we go from here._  
  
He held the backspace key definitively with his pinky, waiting until the entire final paragraph had disappeared into the blinking curser’s hungry jaws.  
  
 _I forwarded your email to Tezuka, just in case he hadn’t heard anything about the event, I’m sure he already did. I’ll get in touch with you if I hear back from him.  
  
-Oishi  
  
\---  
Oishi-  
  
I assume you told Momoshirou that I caused you no trouble at all.   
  
Yamato-buchou mentioned the event to us at practice – he will not be attending, but I intend to ask all of our remaining teammates to come along. Kikumaru’s attendance in mandatory, and I will have him run laps if he refuses to show – make sure he understands.  
  
-Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
Tezuka-  
  
I told Momo that you are far more trouble as a friend than as a captain.  
  
Tezuka, I would say you can’t make Eiji run laps anymore, but I think you have him so well programmed that he wouldn’t even notice himself doing it if you commanded him.  
  
By the way, I never thanked you.  
  
-Oishi  
  
\---  
  
Hn.  
  
There is no need to thank me.  
  
-Tezuka  
  
\---  
  
No, there is. You really saved me.  
  
-Oishi  
  
\---  
  
From Kikumaru?_  
  
\---  
  
Exams came and went and Oishi hardly even noticed – he left only a couple days after they had moved out of the dorms to intern at a hospital in Tokyo. He had filled out and submitted the application to the school in Italy, and one of the requirements was a certain amount of hours interning in the field they intended to pursue. The whole affaire was still kept secret from Kikumaru, though Tezuka was on the phone with Oishi almost every night sometime after work and dinner but before Kikumaru would predictably show up at his door: patiently, Tezuka would humor him – supply him with a few curt words of reassurance and support… in his own Tezuka way.  
  
Summer bled away quickly into autumn in that fashion; they were back at school, moving into the dorms once again. Oishi and Eiji now had a room on the third floor in a building of all upper-classmen. As upperclassmen, they volunteered to help the first years move into their dorms, carrying personal possessions and helping them with heavy furniture. By some stroke of luck, they encountered Fuji Yuuta looking particularly annoyed at his brother’s insistence on helping him with his computer and other heavy items.   
  
“I can carry them, it’s okay,” insisted the younger brother, huffily. Smiling as usual, the older brother paid it no heed whatsoever. Naturally, the moment he saw the Fuji family there, Kikumaru had run off to talk with them and help Yuuta move. With only a brief hello to the older Fuji brother, Oishi left the scene to go in search of Mizuki who would, undoubtedly, be pleased to discover his former teammate was moving in that day, if he was not already aware of the fact.  
  
The pervasive sense of purple that followed the former St. Rudolf player as a fruity perfume on a salary woman shone like the brightest star that could not be ignored by anyone – it seemed that once again, this year, Mizuki was going for some sort of award as the most flamboyant second year student in the school. The strange almost-friendship that had developed between Mizuki and Oishi kept the former vice captain’s mouth shut, for the most part, about any questionable fashion choices.  
  
The day passed mostly peacefully; by the time dinner was over, and they had seen enough of the Fuji brothers and Mizuki for one day, the Golden Pair retreated to their new dorm room, getting ready for bed. It was warm in the room – by the time they lied down to sleep, sharing a bed already soaked with sweat, the late-summer heat had filled the room; paying no heed to the fans that tried to circulate the air properly – it was just plain hot.  
  
“Eiji, could you… do you mind if we sleep in separate beds tonight?” The words were mumbled from swollen lips into slick hair – between them, beneath the thin layer of a single sheet, filmy sweat was the only thing, it felt, that kept them from being of the same skin, as though they could meld together fully.  
  
The redhead was clearly chastened. “Yeah – if that’s what you want.” They awkwardly disentangled themselves, nearly collapsing over the side of the bed onto the floor in the process. The older gave a nervous laugh, the younger a sloppy kiss to his partner’s mouth, and they parted ways for the night, Oishi bathed in another person’s sweat, Kikumaru to a clean bed.  
  
 _He knew Kikumaru had discovered the envelope with the application from the way the boy went silent. For several weeks, that was all there was between them – silence. Even in the times they had attempted intimacy (a mistake, Oishi quickly learned) there was a blistering silence between them, burning like fire that did not crackle but was no less hot. It blazed through their shared classes, their meals, and their study hours – blazed through passionless kisses and distracted conversations. Kikumaru never looked him in the eye anymore. He never spoke his name anymore. Oishi Syuichirou had been reduced to an expressionless “you” or “him” in the world of Kikumaru Eiji; a thought that had never before even occurred to Oishi.  
  
They were partners – even if everything else went wrong, that should have stayed strong.   
  
How much of the application had Kikumaru seen? Oishi would ponder this while studying the profile of the redhead so intently during his science lesson that he forgot to take notes – not that he had heard the teacher to begin with. He would think on it further while sneaking glances at Kikumaru over the brim of a textbook or the edge of the pillow as he lay awake in the middle of the moon’s waltz across the sky.  
  
He was positive of his answer when the redhead finally burst out – shattering the silence like an expensive vase – “January? When were you going to tell me, Oishi. January is three months away!” There were tears in his eyes, but they were not of sorrow – and probably not anger. Confusion? Kikumaru never would tell Oishi even when the older boy did his best to explain the situation.  
  
“I don’t know if I’m in yet, Eiji,” he said calmly. “It’s very selective, I probably won’t even go.” He tried to reassure his partner with a hug, but the smaller boy shirked the embrace, locking himself in a stall in the communal bathroom and refusing to come out.  
  
Oishi spoke to the stark cream-coated metal door for hours that night, well into the earliest hours of the morning, when finally his raspy, abused voice lured a red-eyed Kikumaru from the stall. Whether it was lack of sleep or if his partner was crying, Oishi did not know, but the younger boy folded into Oishi’s arms, speaking not a single word, bringing forth again the silence._  
  
It had been a true treat to spend time with his team again – even Kawamura had made an appearance at the reunion of sorts, promising his former classmates a free sushi dinner if they all gathered at the restaurant the next day. It was a Saturday, late fall, verging on winter. The clouds were gray and threatening foul weather, but it could not be felt within the familiar confines of the clubhouse… a building in which Oishi felt like an alien – an outsider that did not belong despite spending so many years changing in that very locker room… for practice, for games. He had memories of an awkward hug with Tezuka just beyond the door – Eiji holding fistfuls of his shirt and demanding how he could abandon the Golden Pair… this place had the birth of something that had become almost sacred; untouchable.   
  
“I can’t go to university with you.” This could not have come as a surprise to Kikumaru, “I’ve applied to study abroad.” Those words were not nearly as hard to speak as they were to iterate – the actual physical act of creating the sound was easy, but the uneasy sloshing of fluids in his stomach at his doubles partner’s face was more than a bit unnerving.  
  
He had expected Kikumaru to disbelieve him; to write the statement off as a bad joke on Oishi’s part. Or, better, to get angry and shout about how Oishi was not allowed to leave him behind, breaking up the famed “Golden Pair.” But perhaps he had seen it all along – he had known from the moment he caught an accidental glimpse of the letter that had nearly been forgotten in Oishi’s mailbox that in the end, Oishi would leave him for something bigger in a far-off place.  
  
It was in the locker room; their former teammates had long ago left them alone in the room. Oishi’s eyes drifted down to the hand that clasped the very hem of his jersey over his hip. The second hand, coming too quickly after, was on his collar, holding him still long enough to be kissed.  
  
The chemistry – boiling, poofing,  _exploding_  chemistry – between them was truly astounding. The kiss was light, unintrusive, yet holding layers of passion and unexpressed feelings. The tentative touch of a warm tongue, the trademark taste of nearly sticky saliva, and the feel of another body urging him to not move even a centimeter devoured him whole.  
  
This feeling – this feeling that had been so amazing the first time – this was a feeling that he had known so many times; breathy words between frantic brushes of the lips – wet, warm gasps in the midst of passion, sweat beading on their skin – a thousand little pearls of words they should have said so many times… it was too late now.  
  
Hands against his partner’s chest, he pushed the younger boy away. “Eiji, I’ve already taken care of all the transfer papers. I intend on staying there through university, not just the next year and a half.” For the first time in so many months of happiness, Oishi absolutely positive it was his fault that Eiji began to cry.  
  
He felt cold – if he let himself feel too much, then, he would lose nerve or break to pieces on the spot. The cold only masked the heavy pit in his stomach like a peach with a core of iron; the tingling regret that shivered along his spinal chord, the tensing muscles of his lower back, the acidic burn of his throat and eyes… the cold, he realized, actually hid something insufferably searing. He reached out a hand for Kikumaru’s tears, stopping himself short, fearing that he might freeze them to his partner’s cheek… or the blazing sensation running up through his body, stabbing his heart, bleeding down to his feet, would burn Kikumaru before his very eyes.  
  
When Kikumaru cried, it was not attractive. It was an affaire that involved mucus and salt – it involved loud heaves of half-whined backwards coughs and wailing sobs that shook his body so hard he collapsed from his feet, landing painfully on the cement below. “Oishi – you…” He did not seem to have the words – the better for Oishi. He had a lot of words he needed Kikumaru to listen to; he did not have time to hear.  
  
“I’m going to improve my singles game, I don’t want to be a crutch for another person, anymore.” The words bit harder than the tone of his voice – his diction stronger than any emotion he threw behind them. “I don’t plan on playing doubles anymore.”  
  
A particularly loud sob cut him off, the redhead scrambling to his feet, collecting two fistfuls of Oishi’s jersey and shouting in the older boy’s face. “It really didn’t mean anything to you, did it? Us – this thing – the Golden Pair. This is nothing at all to you!” His words came out scrambled and slurred, only recognizable from years of decoding Kikumaru’s sleepy slurs when he first woke up, mumbling against Oishi’s neck even as the sun kissed their cheeks. The image made Oishi’s knees weak, melting at the joint, locking awkwardly to compensate as he tried to appear calm, removing Kikumaru’s hands from his shirt.  
  
“I never said that,” he stated flatly. “This is what I need to do for my life – for what I want to do. Eiji, you knew that we wouldn’t last forever, I’d just rather we break things off now than end up hurting one another when I go to the other side of the world and don’t return for however many years it takes.” He chewed at his lip, the dryness moving from his throat into his mouth – he suddenly did not have nearly enough saliva to keep his tongue wet; it seemed any saturation in his body was being delegated to his eyes.  
  
“It should last forever,” roared Eiji in response, his whole body suddenly appearing taller as he straightened his shoulders and subconsciously rose to tip-toe. “ This was supposed to be forever. You and me – we’re supposed to be partners.” The look on his face now expressed anger, though tears continued to flow freely down Kikumaru’s face. “You’re my partner – partners look out for one another. Partners stay together. Partners don’t aba…”  
  
He would never finish the word. Oishi collected the bag that carried his tennis gear, slinging it onto his shoulder. “I am not your partner, if that’s what a partner is,” snapped the older boy. “Grow up, Eiji. You’re acting like a child.”   
  
“I  _am_  a child, Oishi! So are you!” Panic flashed in the redhead’s eyes as he realized he had only accomplished making Oishi angry – the older boy snapping out of the coldness that he had shrouded himself in, letting all of his hurt, despair, and anger focus into his eyes – into single tear – that shook Kikumaru into a wobbly step forward, bracing himself with one arm for support against the lockers to his side – one of which had been his, directly next to Oishi’s. “Syuichirou, I love you.”  
  
The sound of his heart cracking in two was nicely covered by the door closing in his wake. “That has nothing to do with it,” insisted Oishi.   
  
He would not cry for hours still – not until he stood in their dorm room, a room half-emptied of belongings… though Oishi could not bring himself to take anything that was distinctly “theirs.”  
  
Gently, he kissed Daigoro goodbye.  
\---


	21. Chapter 21

\---  
  
 _Dearest Oishi,_  
  
I was scrap booking this past Sunday when I came across a photograph of you from junior high. Tezuka says that it’s weird that a person my age still scrap books, but I don’t want to forget, now do I?  
  
The picture is from my second year of junior high. It is easy to recognize; we proudly wear bold blue uniforms and shit-eating grins. I stand to the side – Yuuta stands beside me – but they are the ones that catch my eye. They are still smiling. They are still gazing into each other’s eyes as though they were alone on a starry night, curled up together under a blanket or perhaps enjoying the New Year’s sunrise together dressed in traditional kimonos and drinking sake.  
  
Closing my eyes, the scene plays out upon my eyelids like a silent film – the details of my memory so palpable that I feel the cool breeze on my cheeks, the creeping sweat down my spine, and the thick taste of my tongue and saliva heavy in my mouth.   
  
He trembles without knowing it – his knees shake just slightly, his jittering shivers pulsing through the chained fence clutched in his hands. His eyes are where they have always been, whether he knows it or not. I watch him, at first, in a sort of amused wonder before I can look back to the boy on the court.   
  
He is winning. He is winning singles when he was made to play doubles, but he is only winning barely. He glances uncertainly, from time to time, over his shoulder at the crowd – their eyes lock, his partner looks away… the boy on the court just looks sad.  
  
Yuuta comes up beside me – he smells of laundry detergent and musky foreign cologne. I have not seen him much this summer – I am honestly surprised he chose to come, though he has not said even a word to me. His hair is short – I think it looks good on him.  
  
The crowd lets out a silently uproarious cheer, jumping from the bleachers. My eyes drift sideways to a calmly pleased vice captain. Though it is small, I can see the smile starting to curve on the very edge of Tezuka’s face. The redhead beyond the fence grins; he gives us a victory sign. I smile back. Yuuta says nothing, looking away.  
  
Later, when we gather around to congratulate Eiji, I hand the camera slung around my neck to Tezuka, asking him quietly to take our picture. Before I can express my feelings of joy, he has wrapped himself around his partner. They are laughing, their faces close and eyes closed.   
  
Tezuka barks at us to stand together for the picture. They are not looking at the camera. Yuuta is complaining. The picture is taken.  
  
My eyes open; I’m very suddenly sitting in a pool of photographs – each holding a palpable memory like the one in the photograph in my hand. There is another man, a man who creates dreams and memories, ignoring me while he works on his homework. He mutters the formulas on the page to himself as he copies them from the textbook to loose-leaf paper to solve each separate problem. I, mostly, ignore him, too.  
  
I put so much effort into that – into them. I remember best the moments when I would have the uncharacteristic desire to shout at those two people; to lock them in a linen closet and let them work it out themselves. I remember the burning satisfaction of catching them in unguarded moments – in receiving a call for help from both – either – that I responded to without hesitation.  
  
I remember the night Eiji met Tezuka and me outside the museum, his uniform slightly out of order, his hair mused. He looked like a zombie – a man whose soul was long eaten by some unknown heartache; his movements sluggish and painful – like a man who had been so badly abused that every slight twitch of muscles brought about another ache – another pain – another bruise. He told me that his partner was going to Europe – he never told me another word, just cried in my arms while Tezuka politely diverted his eyes.  
  
You’re thinking about him, now, aren’t you? About Eiji. You were thinking about him when you saw the airmail stamp on this letter, long before you read my name as the return address – you think about him every time you open your mailbox. I know you, Syuichirou, so don’t even try to lie to me about it. I only hope you stop lying to yourself about it; maybe things didn’t work out between you, but he’s still your partner. Whenever you’re done running away from him, you should come back to Japan – he wants that more than the world.  
  
It never rains anymore, it seems. After all that freak weather we’ve had in early fall that gave us trouble with tennis practice, it seems to be particularly dry this past year. Kuni-ippo says it’s because I keep talking about it; that I’m jinxing the weather. Who knew he was superstitious? Oh – and he has seen me write “Kuni-ippo.” I do believe I’ll be running laps when this letter is finished, though where I’m not entirely certain. We’re on our way to a tournament – he is still bitter that I wanted to sit beside him, I think. But he’s reading over my shoulder again. Hello, Mitsu-pon. Oh, that’s a new face.  
  
He says that you should take care of yourself, Oishi. I think that’s Tezuka for “I miss you,” but you’d probably know much better than I do how to decode him. He’s not looking at me anymore. Can’t say I blame him.  
  
I should go; looks like we’re almost there. I will mail this tonight.   
  
Hope Italy is all it is supposed to be, and that you are thriving. But, I also hope that this letter will remind you that sometimes our priorities get a little backwards, even when it seems like we’re doing the right thing. Sometimes we get a little bit ahead of ourselves and forget what is really important to us. We never know until it is all said and done, but sometimes what is right and what is right for us are two different things – you should consider that carefully.   
  
Take care,  
Fuji  
  
\---


	22. Chapter 22

\---  
The first stars winked to life in the darkening sky – shining out through the indigo of the dusk sky behind wisps of clouds that still glowed orange with the blood of the dying sun. The wind gave a shuddering sigh, passing though the trees and tossing Oishi’s curls in his eyes. The man raised a hand, holding his hair firmly out of his eyes, his fingers knitting with his hair to keep it from straying back to his forehead.  
  
A moment of silence came between them; Kikumaru had situated himself on the ground with his back leaned into the fence long before – Oishi had only joined him when he got to telling about the concert… then his legs had started to fold beneath him, so he saved himself some embarrassment by settling there beside his former doubles partner, sitting just a bit too close to be a friendly distance… some habits were hard to break.  
  
“I’m doing okay, right? Have I… didn’t mess it up for both of us…” The words slid out of Oishi’s mouth before he knew he was thinking them – or even what to do with them.  
  
“You’re doing okay,” responded the younger redhead, putting a careful hand to Oishi’s shoulder – fastening over cloth as though those fingers simply belonged where they sat – sitting against a familiar resting point. “You didn’t mess anything up,” conceded Kikumaru, his voice hitching. “I – It was my…”  
  
The older man shook his head. “No, it was both of us.” His right hand reached up, settling over the hand that rested on his shoulder, his eyes meeting with dark blue eyes almost the same shade as the sky; eyes that were no longer obstructed by curls of red hair. For a moment they sat silent together like that, before their fingers laced – a natural habit of too many years of ease with physical proximity. Still, a nervous tremor shaking his body, Oishi’s tongue flicked out over his lips. “How did you know I was going to be here?”  
  
Kikumaru laughed leaning their shoulders together. “Your mom called mine when you showed up at home – you’re supposed to tell people when you come back to the country suddenly.” The other man’s eyes diverted, his hand slipping away, arms curling around his legs that he pulled against his chest. “Mom says that you’re looking for an apartment in Tokyo… you know, I’ve got a couch, if you need somewhere to stay until…” He gave his former doubles partner a shy look from the very corner of his eye. The older man thought Kikumaru’s profile was handsome without the bandage to obscure the sharp angles of his face. He looked thinner – nicely toned. He was… grown up. Quite suddenly, Oishi felt ice drip on his heart, painful and calming in the same stroke – this was the man the bratty boy who had collided with him all those years ago was becoming.  
  
Carefully, the older man studied the person who was in all likelihood his first, and until then, only love. He wanted to say no to the redhead – he did not want to be the one to break Kikumaru’s heart with more false hopes. But he also had never learned how to say no to the younger man – or goodbye. Instead, he said nothing, looking away.  
  
“You’re wearing it,” commented the redhead, his voice no more than a heavy, sighing breath. “I never took mine off.” The marching of little ant feet down Oishi’s spine from the sudden touch made him look in the opposite direction sightlessly, closing his eyes to reality for a moment. His partner’s right hand was in his own – the cool band of gold pressing into his palm.  
  
“Hey, Eiji…” With a deep breath of rain-flavored air, green eyes fixed on blue. Short red curls kissed the very edges of a pale face – a similar curl at the edges of his lips. Whatever it was that he had been intending to say remained sitting on his tongue for a long time. Quiet oozed into the gap between them – but it was a comfortable sort of quiet. “…I’m transferring to Tokyo.” He paused, watching emotions shifting over Kikumaru’s face mercurially, like a lazily spun kaleidoscope. “So… maybe… if you have the time, you could tell me… what happened to us? I mean, how you saw it?”  
  
The younger man’s expression softened immediately, his eyes glassy, but no hint of actually crying. “Yeah,” he replied – his voice hitching so badly that Oishi could only guess at what his partner was trying to say from the motion of his lips. Blinking rapidly, Kikumaru added. “Can… can you tell me about Italy, too?”  
  
With a small nod, Oishi gave the hand in his a squeeze. “Yeah – but it’s a long story.”  
  
“I have a long time.”  
  
When Kikumaru was happy, he could outshine even the brightest of stars. And, Oishi found, it was quite infectious.   
  
They stood together, brushing themselves off – Oishi patted away the invisible dirt from his pants before collecting the tennis gear back into his bag, slinging it over his shoulder. He paused obligingly as Kikumaru tied his shoes, looking out over the courts where he had made some of his first real memories.   
  
Names and faces sprang to mind – teammates and upperclassmen, his coach, other students from the school. When Oishi thinks back on his life, even in his old age, he thinks of this place as his place of conception and birth; his home, where Oishi Syuichirou learned how to be alive – how to love and how to hurt. It was where he met the man who first taught him how to dream, and the other man who taught him how to realize dreams.   
  
It was dark; either that, or Oishi’s imagination was playing tricks on him… or perhaps he really was going blind. The world faded in and out of focus, blurring and smudging even as he watched. He did not even realize why it was until a voice suddenly interjected into his thoughts, “Happy birthday, Syuichirou.” Heated tears – burning against the cool of his cheeks – rolled down Oishi’s face as his eyes fell on his former partner.  
  
Kikumaru smiled.   
  
Oishi smiled back; it was then that he could believe there were no ill feelings between them. There never had been. Even after separation – even after the failed romance, they were one thing above all else – they were the Golden Pair. Two words that held so little meaning on their own, but so much more with Oishi and Kikumaru to give them definition.   
  
\---  
  
 _“…Broadcasting live from the fifth day of the Australia Open. For those of you just joining us, today is men’s doubles – we’re two games into the third match of the afternoon between the underdogs from Sweeden and the heavily favored Japanese pair –Syuichirou Oishi and Eiji Kikumaru.”_  
  
“That’s right. Japan’s so-dubbed ‘Golden Pair’ has yet to even lose a game. They are the youngest pair competing in the tournament – Kikumaru is only nineteen; and they sure are a crowd favorite for it. Especially Oishi – he’s popular with the female fans.”  
  
There was laughter.  
  
“Kikumaru is known world-wide for his acrobatic playing style – the combination with O…”  
  
The TV shut off abruptly, leaving only the eerie glow that lasted a moment after the monitor was turned off and the heavy silence left behind from the lack of the announcers' voices. Touching a finger to the glasses over the arch of his nose, the brunette returned to his work – the outcome of the match was inevitable, after all. There was no better chemistry between players in all of doubles tennis than that between Oishi and Kikumaru.   
  
It was tiny – and it was shown to no one but the table and papers below him, but it was a real smile nonetheless that graced Tezuka’s lips.  
\---  
  
The end

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Upon its original publication in 2005, this story received a number of negative comments for the ending being ultimately unsatisfying. This is the original "unsatisfying" ending, though I have considered a re-write many times over the years. Thanks for slogging through 50,000 words to get here.


End file.
